4. Stage 2- May 2020 Lift Up Bridge Work Begins

To allow access to the inside of the loop I decided to build a lift up bridge to go over an opening left in a lattice fence that forms the front of the railway.

The Opening

After seeking ideas/suggestions from people who have built these type of bridges on various forums I settled on this idea provided by Korm Kormsen from the Large Scale Central forum.

The main difference is that the hinge mechanism is below the rail as opposed to what appeared to be the norm of the hinge being above the railhead height.

I  started by building the mounting point to which the  hinges will be attached, it is held on by and angle bracket and 2 steel posts concreted into the ground.

Hinge mounting mounting point

I chose gate hinges because they were stronger and more robust then the normal door hinges plus the are galvanised.  
They will have to be recessed into the mounting block so that bridge support is level with the approaches roadbed.

Hinge Closed

Hinge Open

The hinges will have to be fixed away from the end of the roadbed to allow for the bridge to swing up without fouling the end of the roadbed.  A gap slightly larger that the height of bridge support timber will have to be left for the end of the support to fold into.

I will take this part of the build very slowly making sure the the bridge can be opened and closed with confidence before proceeding.
To this end I will have to complete the base boards on the other side of the opening so that is the next thing that will be done.

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