Model Railroading > Summit Snow Sheds

I'm trying to figure out what size the precast concrete panels were that were used in construction for these sheds. An article that appeared in the December 2010 Trains magazine tells me how tall they were and how much they weighed but does not give a width for them. I'm trying to scale out a drawing for an HO project and this would be extremely helpful!

Summit,NV on the SP or Summit, MT on the GN?

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

Sorry, Donner Summit on the SP...Particularly Tunnels 6, 7, and 8.

Maybe just look up the weight of a given volume of concrete and back-figure it into the missing dimension? Would be close enough? My "Machinery's Handbook" (1982) says concrete weighs 137 lbs, per cubic foot...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/29/14 13:15 by Kimball.

Kimball Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Maybe just look up the weight of a given volume of
> concrete and back-figure it into the missing
> dimension? Would be close enough? My
> "Machinery's Handbook" (1982) says concrete weighs
> 137 lbs, per cubic foot...


To do this he would need the thickness of the pre-cast. I do not think he has that either.

Personally, I would wing it and scout out local projects such as underpass or commercial warehouses; there are pre=cast structures like the latter going up everywhere but God knows why as it sure won't be to house all of the manufacturing going in. You then need to take into account the fact those pre-casts would have needed to come up from Auburn, Sacramento or Reno thereby limiting the size. My gut feel is they will be either 6 or 8 feet wide as it would be hard to truck them into a remote location.

Rick

The unit weight of normal weight concrete is about 145 - 150 lb per cubic foot. If you can study some photos of the sheds you should be able to scale the width and length of the panels from some known dimension like the track gauge or wheelbase of a locomotive or car. I would think that if you used 12" - 16" thick you would be close.

Old Bob out in Lost Wages



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/29/14 22:47 by chuchubobnv.

One of the Kalmbach or Carstens soft cover books had the dimensions and photos but I don't recall which. Also, perhaps a look into the Model Railroad magazine index will turn something up, as it would have originally have been in a magazine article.

wabash2800 Wrote:
----------------------------------------------
> One of the Kalmbach or Carstens soft cover books
> had the dimensions and photos but I don't recall
> which.

Kalmbach's "Bridges and Buildings for Model Railroads" had information/drawings on the older wooden sheds, not the concrete ones.

Mark

I did, however, see info and drawings for the concrete ones too but don't remember where.

Victor A. Baird
http://erstwhilepublications.com