The Model Railroader's Guide to Bridges, Trestles & Tunnels Paperback – January 1, 2005

The book is helpful with bridges and there history. It has picture of the actual bridges and when they were built and used. I am building an HO scale train layout and want to be period correct. The book was helpful.

This book is an excellent guide to model railroad bridges, trestles, and tunnels. It presents all types of construction including wood, stone, iron, concrete, etc and all era's from the early 18th century to the present.Many prototype photographs and illustrations are used to show the different types of bridges. You don't have to be a civil engineer to read the book, but it will give you a very good detailed view of each type of bridge.Each section in the book ends with information on how to model these structures. This includes construction details including sources for the needed products. Information is also included on how to finish the products.When I now see a bridge while traveling I have good knowledge of why and how the bridge was constructed.I am not a modeler (at least yet) but I think this book will appeal to both novices and more experienced modelers. I have two other similar books and this book is by far the best of the three. I highly recommend it.

This guide had some very useful information in it, but was not super sophisticated. One important part, which caused me to change my plan, was to construct the remainder of the scenery...mtns, rock cliffs etc and paint them first, and go on to add the bridge later. For me that caused a take down of a fair amount of track to get access to do the scenery inside an inner loop. I had not thought to do this first, but the suggestion was good. My desire was to add a very large curved trestle bridge, with a track going under the upper trestle part. No instruction for doing this sort of thing, though I do not think it will be very difficult to figure out. Also, not much on stability etc for very long trestle...again I anticipate no major problem but we shall see. Instructions on making the bents are quite clear and helpful.I also had an interest in bridge track, with the central 70 scale rails. There were some helpful comments on this. I purchased a "Bridge piece" of track but it as a) straight and b) too short and c) only in 083. Buyer beware...I had not checked carefully enough just what I wanted. The rest of the layout is in scale 100...so I was faced with the need for conversion tracks...just made for more of a mess with which I am not yet finished. I never found a flexible section of bridge track in the catalogue, and am still considering making my own. Further, the Walthers large trestle bridge (one of the ones I will use) is expandable for quite a long length, but does not have roadbed pieces for all of the length possible, and in the roadbed that it does have, is clearly designed for inserting the individual rails on the wood frame. Those among us who may be less compulsive with scale might just wish to lay down our own track on top of our own framing to go over the bents, or even on top of the roadbed provided.It is a learning process, and not all of the learning bits are included in this guide. But still it was quite useful.

A good general overview of various types of Trestles, Bridges with a light touch on Tunnels. The author comments on several types of bridges in general use over the two eras of railroading, steam and diesel. He does demonstrate how he and others have made up a few different ones, shows the use of jigs for making up trestle structures and gives a few tips and tricks on adding some interesting details to model railroad layouts. Not a comprehensive digest but more of an idea manual to get you started on making your own as well as making use of available kits for these structures. Lots of illustrations and period photos, diagrams as well as a few explainations on some of the more complicated engineering ideas that get used to make up Bridges and Trestles. A little bit of nomenclature is added to your vocabulary as you read through the chapters and a few of the tips are downright handy.

The book gives great ideas on how to make Trestles, Bridges, and Tunnels, made out of Wood, or Styrene. The book gives measurements to follow and great pictures for ideas. I used the book for building Trestles. Thanks Dan.

Suffers somewhat from a dual personality in that it is a book about RR structures and also a book about how to model them. Provides good information much of it new to most.

So much interesting materiel and photos here...i never realized there were so many kinds of bridges...excellent photo facts and history.

I thought this book would be full of instructions on how to create many types of bridges, trestles, etc shown on the cover. Yes, there are a few pages of bridge building but the book focuses predominantly on bridge/trestle history. I had hoped that a scale chart would be included to help with sizing a bridge for each scale of train. Unfortunately the directions and measurements are for small scales. We have a G scale outdoor railway and this book was not worthwhile for me.

This book has something to offer every modeller; whether you are a novice or experienced old-timer, whether you model prototype or freelance, whether you shake the box, kitbash or scratchbuild.The book is profusely illustrated with prototype photos and numerous photos of the author's own models and how he built them. He takes you step-by-step through a number of projects and discusses how to modify kits or scratchbuild to meet your own specific needs. His own photos are particularly good.It also includes a great deal of technical information that is useful to any modeller interested in prototype accuracy. There is also a wealth of information on suppliers.I recommend this book to every serious modeller. My only criticism is that, although he pictures several examples of pony trusses, he never really defines 'pony truss'. Never mind.Buy this book today!

a very good book, well detailed and simple explanations make this an invaluable addition to anyone contemplating adding these features to their layouts.

An excellent book with great detail and photos for the model railroad builder

Quickly delivered, I found this book contained much useful information.Structures such as this are not readily available to UK modelers, so I would highly recommend this as a basic guide.

very good