Wood truss bridge at Forks Creek

[Todd Hackett]

I've been looking at photos of the original wood truss bridge at Forks Creek, and finding it to be very interesting. All of the other wood Howe truss bridges on the line (and pretty much all others I've noticed) have diagonal compression timbers sloping up to the center (which I think is what defines them as Howe trusses), usually smaller cross diagonals sloping the other way, vertical tension rods, and wood top and bottom chords. This bridge has the diagonal compression timbers sloping up toward the center, but no cross timbers and the bottom chord is pin-connected iron or steel. The rods are in a cross pattern instead of vertical, with the main tension rods being paired (one on each side of each diagonal compression timber, except in the middle where the diagonals from both directions cross) and single intermediate rods running the other direction between them.

This is my interpretation of what I'm seeing in the photos:



When I first started digging though photos I wanted one that shows the bridge from the side. All of the photos I saw in my collection were from the depot end, like this one which has a stupid train blocking the details of the bridge:



I did a web image search, and the only useable photo I found was in the Narrow Gauge Discussion Forum. It turns out that not only did I have that stereo view in my collection, the image on NGDF was from one of my posts. I had cropped it from a stereo view which showed much more of the site (although that crop was larger since the topic dealt more with the depot and eating house), which is why I missed in when I was scanning through my images. While not very clear, in this image, it looks like the top members connecting the two trusses consist of timbers running perpendicular to the sides with diagonal crossed rods between them, while the other photos that show the top have diagonal crossed timbers with rods that are perpendicular to the sides.



This photo from DPL turned out to be the most useful (used in conjunction with my side view):



Zooming in on the left side shows the pin-connected pieces making up the bottom chord:



Zooming in on the right shows some sort of block between the first diagonal timber and the vertical timbers at the end of the bridge.



Does anyone have any more details on the bridge or any dimensional information?

[Todd Hackett]

For comparison, here are the bridge at Elk Creek:



And Huntsman's Ranch:

[Mike Trent]

Great work, Todd. Some years ago, Rick Steele posted a lot of dimensional data from C&S records, and if I'm not mistaken, there was data on structures and bridges. I know the mainline structures were included, I'm not sure about Clear Creek.

That information is in the Blog which this forum is part of. There is a link on the header. Good luck.

[Todd Hackett]

I was hoping to find the Bridge & Building book, but I didn't see it in the files area. I didn't think to check the blog, but I can't find it there either (by scanning post topics or searching the blog for "bridge" or "building" or "forks creek"). Any dimensions there would be for the later steel truss bridge, but I expect that the overall length would be the same.

[Mike Trent]

I don't think you can search by location. Look for those big/huge files from Rick. it takes a long time to load and you have to scroll a long time to find anything. I don't remember the dates. I was looking for the Dickey Bunkhouse and eventually found it.

[Kurt Maechner]

I know this isn't the focus of the thread, but I finally had a chance to visit the Forks Creek site last month.

[Chris Walker]

Todd,

the Fork's Creek Bridge isn't a Howe, more a "Box" Truss with some similarities shared with the Fink Truss.  A Pin-connected Howe Truss was at Deansbury, with Pomeroy Gulch having an Inverted Pin-connected Howe (from memory).

Denver Public Library MCC-260 (and WHJ-109)



I've asked on here once about the CC B&B but Derrell said he'd never seen one.

CC RR book has some info, mentions 100ft length.

The Rick Steele B&B listings are here... http://c-sng-discussion-forum.254.s1.nabble.com/Two-Railroad-Rosters-tp14478p14532.html


And Fork's before they concreted it over....

[Kurt Maechner]

Hey, Chris,
Do you mind if I use that 1982 Forks Creek photo over my blog?
Kurt

[Chris Walker]

Kurt,

It's a pretty poor photo, given that it is of a print in an album, that the prints are covered by an adhesive plastic film and thus photographed at an angle to cut down on the reflection.  Are you wanting it "as is" for your post?

[Kurt Maechner]

"As is" is totally fine. It doesn't have to be high resolution. I just like showing how the area has changed over the years.
Kurt

[Chris Walker]

Kurt, contact me with your Email for this if you want.

[Kurt Maechner]

Hi Chris, I sent my email via personal message.

[Chris Walker]

Todd,

I can't remember if I ever put this Clipping up on the Board before now(?)