FoolTrottel

Same here Gec. Have seen that before, I did not really care about it much Will look into it... I may be able to fix it, or maybe make it disappear all together ... who needs propaganda anyways?

Well, not much to tell there, we never found him, but we managed to quickly find a döppelgänger in the local old folks home, and sent him back to the Vatican ...

Line up of all nine ships. The longer deck created, and mounted is a test fit. And hey, it all fits, and lines up! So, next up is creating over 70 cm's of railings... Here's a shot of the set up I created for transforming them bamboo cocktail pickers into planks for the deck. On the left, coffee! Below that, the remnants of the pickers, the curly bit I cannot use. Then there's the small container holding the end product. Above it the raw materials. Then there's the cutting device, with some extra tool so I can cut the things at a constant length. As each picker has a pointy end, that needs to be cut off. And when I do that, the small cut off bit just flies off, up up and away! The box to the right will catch some of them

Probably, in the end ...

The Pope did visit the area, in a boat. It sank.

tHER` Well, there will be some, in the end, on the bridge, once it's done and ready and has reached the 'diorama' stage

Yes, it would swing out to let bigger ships pass. As for how it was opened, I do not know. Swinging it open would not be too much of an issue, as the swing out would be down stream Only found one picture focussing on the opening, and it suggest it was simply a case of man's muscle power ... this one: It's open now, and these guys just seem to be operating a winch? If they are, one would assume there'd be a cable running towards the other end, yet that would mean the cable would be in the way of passing boats. So, maybe they would only connect the cable when closing it, and maybe that's the reason there's that small boat in the foreground? To ferry the cable over from the other end to the swung out part? It's just a must a guess as whether the Spit was better than the 109, and whether a Hurricane could out turn itself, and be on it's own on tail in less than 3 full circles... it all happened way back then, nobody left alive sane enough to really explain the hows and the what nots...

So, here's the completed section of the part that swings out, the car is in 1:87 scale, so it appears correctly, size wise that is, historically not so much, the car is way too modern. The light coloured horizontal beams that carry the deck are not glued in yet, so one can still vary the height of the deck. Still unsure whether I will create it with normal water level, or high water level. Here's some details on construction of the deck. Glueing all those planks on the frame. Each of them is 3mm wide. So, for 30cm I need 100 of them. No worries, I got 400. Yeah, I maybe miscalculated there. But, at a price of 1 Euro for 50, oh well. A lot of cutting to do though. Here's the jig I created for the railing. 6 cm of railing each time. An I need like well, not sure, but over 1 meters lenght I think, times two. At the bottom one finished piece. Test fitting the first bit. It fits, it works!

I think both the guy and his contraption look equally scary

It is accurate! You can't tell by those pictures, but I found some that show proof of that. No shortage here of anything basically

The boats now have the structure mounted that will support the bridge deck. As for colours to use, I found this:

Thanks very much for that Nick, I am laughing out loud, picturing your erifaeS !! I do need a laugh atm, so, yeah, THANKS! (And it's so recognizable.. You know I am reporting all the good progress I am making, but for sure leaving out all the failed attempts were releasing the boats from their litle jig resulting into them falling apart all together due to me not being patient enough, or using the wrong materials... So frustrating to see all the work put in suddenly turn into a mess of little parts of bamboo... already realize my dreams are in the English language, looks like my spontaneous cussing has also evolved there! Darn! Carp! And shift!

Oh, and thanks for educating me: Indeed I was doubting a bit on that word 'mould'... Though I should know the correct word, as back in 2010 at Duxford's Romainia, I did witness and even touch the jigs they had there to manufacture Spitfire wings!

Better? It's fine already! Boats are indeed different altogether... And from the pictures I can find it shows there's always been a heavy degree of 'maintenance' over the years, wooden boats been replaced with metal ones, the railing being replaced... all makes sense, back in the days, the river would freeze up every now and then, and wreak havoc on the bridge. More changes were made on the fixed part to the left/West, and replacement of the lifting bit... oh well. Since there's basically no one alive that would've seen the real bridge from 1910-ish I am going for, I really can't go wrong! The only thing I can screw up are them fingers!!

Milestone reached! Nine out of nine ships created! In the end, they are not all the same. I used a mould, but still some came out 1cm shorter than others, and some are really crooked... I don't care, no one will be able to tell in the end, I hope... Each ship made out of 20 separate parts. Another milestone: some three years ago I started building that one Road Bridge, next the Railway Bridge, and the Ferry, lots of wood work involved, sanding and cutting. Today, while working on this bridge, I finally cut one of my fingers real good. Called the medics, wasn't sure it needed treatment (Shoot me a PM and I'll send you a picture I took - nothing too special, but yet too bloody messy to show out here in public ), they initially told me it did not. Then they called back as said I needed a Tetanus shot... w00t. So, went out there, and the doctor's opinion was it did not need any stitches, nor did I need that shot - as I wasn't outside! No street dirt! So, in the end they glued it. Well, I tought of that myself, I've been gluing all them parts together, why not glue my finger? Different glue probably ... ) oh well... The small parts layed out at the top left, the right hand one of those, is the next subject of construction, they are the vertical bits that support the deck. Ten in total of the three-wide parts, 8 more of two bit parts. Here's a pic that shows more detail on that vertical stuff: