I had been looking at some fantastic girder bridges in the magazines but they were so expensive so I thought I might try to make my own.
I ended up buying some 6mm square aluminium fencing post, some slightly wider aluminium door edging, styrene strip .060 x .188" and polypropylene plastic sheet.
I screwed lengths of the door strip to opposite sides of the square tube. The overlap seen in the pic. provides a channel which holds the rectangles of plastic sheet which can be slid in from the ends.
The plastic sheet is cut into rectangles and then placed in the jig. A tap of a hammer on the embossing tool makes a dent in the sheet looking like a rivet head.
Styrene strips space each sheet to complete the sides of the girder bridge.
Painted and in place it looks OK. From the side it represents a plate girder bridge, but leaving out the embellishments and adding others could well become a deck girder or I beam?
A mistake was evident. I did not need to use the adhesive on the sheet which created some bubbling caused by air pockets caught in the adhesive pushing out the polypropylene sheet. It was a hot day when installed!
The shorter bridge did not have the sheets glued to the aluminium base. They did not bubble but held fast by the styrene strip and the grooves in the aluminium door strip. Cost about $40 Australian.
I ended up buying some 6mm square aluminium fencing post, some slightly wider aluminium door edging, styrene strip .060 x .188" and polypropylene plastic sheet.
I screwed lengths of the door strip to opposite sides of the square tube. The overlap seen in the pic. provides a channel which holds the rectangles of plastic sheet which can be slid in from the ends.
The plastic sheet is cut into rectangles and then placed in the jig. A tap of a hammer on the embossing tool makes a dent in the sheet looking like a rivet head.
Styrene strips space each sheet to complete the sides of the girder bridge.
Painted and in place it looks OK. From the side it represents a plate girder bridge, but leaving out the embellishments and adding others could well become a deck girder or I beam?
A mistake was evident. I did not need to use the adhesive on the sheet which created some bubbling caused by air pockets caught in the adhesive pushing out the polypropylene sheet. It was a hot day when installed!
The shorter bridge did not have the sheets glued to the aluminium base. They did not bubble but held fast by the styrene strip and the grooves in the aluminium door strip. Cost about $40 Australian.
