Bridge building---

[Brian Rupnow]

I still haven't quite recovered from the Kerzel build, but life rolls on. My good wife has been after me for the last 5 years to build a bridge over the stream on the back of our lot---(You may have seen pictures of the waterwheel I built about 3 or 4 years ago that runs in said stream). Last week I was casting about for something to do, and the bridge issue came up again. I decided that it would make a nice "filler" project between design jobs, so first I did a quick and nasty design, just to figure out what I was going to build----and then I built it. The main horizontal section is 12 foot long, and the approach ramps on each end are 3 1/2 feet long. The deck is 3 foot wide. The main stringers are 2 x 10 pressure treated spruce and the decking is pressure treated 2 x 8 spruce. Since taking the pictures I have put in half a yard of topspoil at the ends and planted a whole whack of Hostas, bleeding hearts, and day lilys at each end. Design work (my real job) is still very hit and miss (No, not THAT kind of hit and miss), and our economic recovery here is still pretty damn sluggish, so I spend more time looking for projects to fill up my time than I do actually working at my "day job". For those of you who take exception to non machining posts, I apologize. I haven't given up on machining in the least, and my next HMEM project may be to design and build a 4 cycle water cooled engine---and if I do, I will definitly share the drawings and build thread with you.---Stay well, and have a great summer.----Brian

 

[b.lindsey]

Nice job Brian!! And when those flowers come up it will be a beautiful spot too (not that the bridge isn't elegant by itself). I hope the wife was pleased...that should keep you in good stead for a while

Regards,
Bill

 

[Brian Rupnow]

Actually Bill, wife is very good about the time and money I spend on my hobbies, hot-rodding and machine shop related stuff. Every once in a while I build something like the bridge, and she is pleased out of all proportion to the amount of work it really took me.----and generally I like whatever it is just as much as she does.

 

[metalmad]

Nice job Brian
Your design ability's are a source of envy for me, not to mention your bridge building .
unfortunately using something like cad is way beyond me at the moment :big:
Pete

 

[Cliff]

Hey Brian nice looking Bridge as long as the wife likes it is all that matters. Will be watching and waiting for your next build I always enjoy following your builds. Cliff

 

[Brian Rupnow]

Pete---If you'd been doing it ever since 1965 like I have, it wouldn't seem like such a big deal.---and by the by---I wouldn't have the faintest idea of how to grind a stump!!! ;D ;D Cliff---Its amazing how badly I get burned out on machining after a long and problematic build. I love machining small engines, but after a long thrash it takes about 3 or 4 months before I want to do it again. I am always amazed by guys like Chuck Fellows, who seem to go from project to project with seemingly no pause, and consistently turn out quality work.---A quick question for North American readers----does anybody know of a wood stain that matches the slime green colour of pressure treated wood? I would like all the freshly cut ends to be the same colour as the rest of the bridge, but a quick internet search hasn't turned up anything.

 

[tel]

Can't say I do, I druther cover up the treated pine colour with a coupla coats of Sola-Guard!

Nice bridge, now all you need is a toll gate!

 

[Brian Rupnow]

Hi Tel---Funny you should mention that. There is a large flock of wild turkeys that live in the woods on the far side of the stream in that woods. I was whining to my neighbour about the high cost of pressure treated lumber, and he suggested the same thing----Put up a toll gate and charge the turkeys 5 cents each to cross the bridge!!!

 

[IronHorse]

Nice bridge, you can get end-cut sealer at the hardware store.

 

[Cliff]

Brian I know what your talking about I ran my Clock business for about ten years working seven days a week a lot of the time and got real burned out on it to the point I don't even want to look at one. Cliff.

 

[Brian Rupnow]

I knew I could work something mechanical that I had built into this thread!!!! The waterwheel was one of the first projects I built when I purchased my lathe and mill 4 years ago. You should have seen the look that the sales clerk gave me when I went into the store and bought 8 stainless steel soup ladles!! That stream is from a spring in the hillside---it runs all year round, and the water has an extremely high mineral content. By last year the "ladles" were so heavily coated with mineral deposits that it weighed about 3 times what it did when I first built it, and would barely turn its own weight. When I tore it out last week to buld the bridge, I bought a container of CLR and have been soaking the ladles in it to clean them---its nice to see it perking along at full speed again. Double click the picture to see a video of it running.---Brian

 

[rake60]

Nice build Brian!

Should you add a warning sign stating, "Shallow Water, No Diving!"

Let's just say I know Grand Kids!

Rick

 

[Brian Rupnow]

There is a bit of a story behind that one Rick. I live near the bottom of a big valley here, and there is a LOT of land higher than my place, mostly miles of farm fields. The spring that feeds my stream is a silt bearing spring. (which I had never heard of before buying this place 12 years ago.) Back in the 1960's when the farmer decided to sell off these lots along the road I live on, he got an excavator to dig ponds on the back of all the lots, thinking, (quite rightly) that the lots would bring more money if they had a stream AND natural ponds on the back. Unfortunately, what he didn't know, was that over the next 10 years, all of these ponds would fill up completely with silt. As long as the stream is fast flowing, the silt stays in suspension, but as soon as the fast flowing stream hits a pond and slows down, the silt settles out.---So---as a consequence, if anybody jumped off my bridge, they wouldn't hurt themselves much. They'd just be up to their neck in really cold, dreadfull, icky mud!!! All of the grandkids have been duly warned, and they don't play out there unsupervised. When I first moved here, wife and I went thru a lot of government Hoo-Haa with the ministry of the environment to get a permit to dig out the pond.---Then I found out it would cost about $10,000 to have it dug out and the muck trucked away. THEN I found out that it would fill up with muck again in about 5 years. THEN I decided to live with it "as is".

 

[Herbiev]

Great bridge and great land. Living in the dryest statte on the driest continent i really envy you