Gary S' 2010 Summer Challenge - Bridge

[Gary S]

Thanks Kevin. I'm working on some more pipes right now, and am taking photos. Will post the techniques later... letting paint dry in between steps right now.

[P5se Camelback]

... And one more photo of a train on the bridge:

   

Wow! The water does get high sometimes! Unless that stuff up on the concrete base is left over from some hapless Osprey's nest!

[Gary S]

biL... are you talking about the dead grass deposits indicated by the green arrows?

   

[Gary S]

I did a "scraped paint rust" tutorial in the weathering forum at http://www.the-gauge.net/forum/viewtopic...=50&t=3213

[Sumpter250]

OK I'll stick my neck out........the "grass" on top of the concrete, is probably left as the water recedes. Deeper water, up near the underside of the bridge, probably moves too fast, and scours the bents of any debris. As the water level decreases, the flow rate is slower, and dead grasses can end up being left where you see them, instead of being washed away.
It also looks like the bridge sections extend from one bent to the next. On top of those are the retainers for the ballast, four per side per bridge section, which is why there are three equidistant "stained" areas, on the bridge sections, from water/dirt washing down through the joints.
That same dirt, has easier exit from the bridge deck, at the section boundaries, down on top of the bent caps, and doesn't get to the sides there.
Yeah, when i was a kid, I drove my parents to distraction with that ever repeated question...........w h y y y y ?
I'm still never satisfied until I can figure out, "why it looks that way". When I do, I can understand not only "the question", but exactly how the thing is put together. Not a bad piece of information, if one is going to build a model of it.

( or....a pretty good story for why it was modeled that way )

[Gary S]

S-two-fiddy, I do believe you are correct on all accounts. I was hoping biL would come back on to answer the question in the green arrows. In all honesty, during a gully-washer rain storm, I have seen the water all they way up to the red line in the photo:

   

[Gary S]

Bent Number 2

First, the real thing

   

Some of the tools needed to do the weathering - various size paint brushes, various colors of craft paint to match the prototype, colored pencils, weathering powders and dullcote.

Here is the bent with a white primer coat on it.

   

First step is to get the base coat on the pipe and the concrete. I didn't have the light gray to match the pipes, so I mixed pure white and medium gray. Also, the pipes below the concrete abutements seem to be more gray than that above, so I mixed two gray shades, one for the upper and one for the lower. For the concrete, I mixed antique white with gray to match.

   

Next I put a black wash on the bottom of the concrete abutement. When I was constructing the bent, I took Squadron putty and mixed it with Testors model cement (someone here gave me that tip) and smeared it on the bottom, then poked around in it with the Exacto knife to get the rock effect.

   

Time for the rust on the pipes. I took a stiff brush and cut the bristles back to make it even stiffer.

   

Then I took golden brown Apple Barrel craft paint (which matched the rust well) and used a pseudo dry-brush technique on the pipes, but instead of dragging the brush, I poked it atthe pipes, trying not to drag the paint around. Just poke the brush straight down and then come back. This worked well for the random rust patterns, although I tried to put the rust where it was on the real thing.

   

And here, the poking is done.

   

Now, to match the proto photo better, the rust had to be cleaned up a bit where there was too much. Took the light gray for the pipes, eye-balled the photo, and painted over the rust where there was none on the real thing.

   

Then, to match the obvious rust patterns and darker rust areas, I took colored pencils and put the obvious lines and patterns in.

   

For the concrete, I got carried away and didn't take any photos Suffice it to say, I first used colored pencils to match the various colored areas on the concrete. Then I put a thin orangish wash and a thin black wash around and on top. Then used some powders to help blend in the contrasting areas from the pencils. After that, dullcoted, then some more washes and powders to tie thigns together and match the prototype. Sorry that I didn't do the photos.

Anyway, it is acceptable so far...

   

[Gary S]

Oh!

Somethng else that Russ and biL and you technical engineering type guys may find interesting - the pipe used on these supports are a spiral welded pipe. I haven't ever seen pipe like that before. Typically, it has a straight welded seam. Coils of sheet steel go through dies and it is shaped from flat into round with the seam being a straight line and the seam is welded. For this pipe, the sheet steel is wrapped around a mandril, like the way the cardboard tube in Christmas paper is made. The seam spirals around the pipe. Different!

I did use the colored pencils to simulate the visible seams, but they didn't show on the photos.

[jim currie]

Gary from what i see you have captured the essance of it very well.
jim

[eightyeightfan1]

Question?
Which one is the real one?...and which one is the model?
I can't tell.

[Gary S]

Jim, 88, I appreciate the very kind comments.

Moving along, I am working on bent 6 now...

   

The 3 double pipe bents, numbers 4, 5, and 6 in the middle are going to be the hardest to do. All of those horizontal cross pipes... :x

And, I am trying to figure how to put the bridge in place once I get that far. Glue all the bents to the bridge first, then gradually and carefully cut out the foam so the bents go down into the proper place? Or put the bents into the foam first, and then put the bridge across the top pf them?

[P5se Camelback]

OK I'll stick my neck out........the "grass" on top of the concrete, is probably left as the water recedes ... As the water level decreases, the flow rate is slower, and dead grasses can end up being left where you see them, instead of being washed away.

Yeah ... what he said!

And ... geez! That red line is UP there!

[mountaingoatgreg]

Gary,

we are going to haveto change your name to "The Flash"
The amount of weathering and detail you are getting on this bridge in the short time you have started construction is amazing. This thread moves so quickly i have a hard time just following it

Thank you also for your tutorial on your technique and great photos of the build, this IS what makes Big Blue the best forum on the net

[Gary S]

biL... With Houston just off the Gulf Coast, this is what happens when we have a huge rain storm moving from north to south - as the storm deposits its rain north of Houston, all the creeks, bayous, and rivers, flow south through the Houston area. So as the waterways rise from the rain in the north, the storm is moving south along with the run-off, and we get a double whammy! Tons of rain from the storm, plus all the run-off from north of us. Seriously, the water does get that high every now and then. Which is why this bayou was deepened and widened leaving the original bent abutements up above the ground.

Greg... I appreciate the comments. I am going quite fast on this one, mainly because I need to get back to work in the layout room. And you are correct, Big Blue is awonderful resource for learning new ways to do things. I love it when someone does a photo tutorial.

Okay... more progress on bent 6

   

[P5se Camelback]

O.K. ... now there's nothing after me here when I start.

First and foremost ...Friggin' AWEsome!!!!!

Next, the "poking" is called "stippling" and there is actually a stipple brush - it's round but has short stiff bristles. I have a couple in my taboret next to my drawing board ... they're escapees from a class I took on Printmaking sophomore year. Oh, and BTW... on a scrap piece of material, try running your thumb across the end of the bristles like on a toothbrush ... another stippling method, not quite as controlled, but effective, nonetheless.

And a question ... what brand of colored pencils are they ... they look to be sort of waxy ... are they? I'm sure they're not Veri-thins and they don't look like PrismaColor, but I'm having a tough time identifying them.

The spiral steel tubes are an incredible manufacturing process ... I got to witness it a number of years back. The sheet steel feeds through rollers which wrap it around a mandrel while a mechanical (robotic) welder knits the edges together as the seam passes by. So cool!

And when it comes to rain ... I took this from my truck in my driveway, the day I got the photos of those colorful pipes that I gathered for you ... I waited in my truck for 45 minutes for this "Scattered Shower" to pass before giving up and taking a standing up bath with my clothes on!