# How did they build wooden trestles?



## Jerry McColgan (Feb 8, 2008)

This may seem like a dumb question but I have often wondered how the railroads (especially the early ones) built the trestles. 

When they finished everything looks so nice and neat and all the sections seem perfect duplicates of the others but when I realize that the supports did not go straight up and down but rather at an angle I wonder how the heck they got all those wood sections hammered into the ground in perfect alignment to where they needed to end up.

Even more interesting is that anyone who has tried to hammer something into the ground knows that occasionally you hit a huge rock and have to go somewhere else.

Since a huge rock would seem a lot stronger than a piece of wood someone wants to hammer through it, what the heck did the railroads do when the ran into a huge underground rock right where they needed to put a bridge support?

As someone who has had to pull up fence posts I also wonder, if a support started going crooked or needed to be replaced, how did they pull up the old wooden support?

From what I have seen the steam machines they used to hammer the posts into the ground were designed to hammer down and not to pull up (I may be mistaken on this).

Anyone know how they did it?

Thanks,

Jerry


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## Spule 4 (Jan 2, 2008)

Piledrivers. And a hoist to lift bits, as used to raise. Rock was blasted. 

Having measured a few OLD wood railroad trestles, they are not as "exact" as one would suspect.


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## Totalwrecker (Feb 26, 2009)




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## smcgill (Jan 2, 2008)

I did it this way.








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## Mike O (Jan 2, 2008)

Jerry, 

Here is a pretty good link to an article by Bob Hyman that discusses how the RGS did it. The article has how to text, materials, drawings, and photos of RGS trestle artifacts. 

http://4largescale.com/trains/trestle.htm 

Mike


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## Madman (Jan 5, 2008)

I could step in here and say something funny with a bite, but then I thought alittle more and said not.


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## Totalwrecker (Feb 26, 2009)

Give yourself a half of a pat on the back....


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