hillflyer

An inside view of 123.75 degrees of the 180 degree first turn, now strung together with horizontal ribbons and some lateral diagonals. This also happens to catch my initial testing of how to lay the first layer of sub track, true to Fred Church’s patented design.

Those of you who have been following remember that after I constructed the 17 bents that make up the 180 degree first curve, I clipped them all in half in order to have easier access to lay the track on the two lower runs. See (11/21/12). This is the first time those lower halves have been placed in their permanent position.

Yesterday I posted a rendering of a cut-away section of track used on Church coasters. Here is my revamped rendering for building it in miniature. You can see I'm using some shortcuts, because even my patience can only go so far. The sticks next to the dime are to show you an example of how thin these pieces are.

Thanks. I do intend on taking some shortcuts for efficiency and materials and patience supply, but I'll try to have it look the same. Drawing of my short cut to be seen next.

Here is a cut-away drawing of Fred Church's patten for laying wooden coaster track. There were lots of 2 x 2's used, especially around the turns. The tangent areas, 2 2 x 8's were stacked in place of the 8 2 x 2's. This type of track was used on the Dragon and its former neighbor, the Airplane. It's very rare, but this style of track can also be seen on both San Diego and Santa Cruz Giant Dippers, the Puyallup's Coaster, and maybe one or two others. I'm working on a system in install each layer of track. What I have so far, I'm quite excited with the results. More on that soon. 1946

This is my pallet for all the horizontal and vertical pieces that will link all the uprights (bents - see previous photo) together. The ones south of (and on) the blue line are ribbon boards for the outer, center, and inner uprights. Church used 2" x 6". On version one of the model (Now in my salvage bin), I started placing the ribbon boards on one bay at a time meaning that I was trying to join two horizontal pieces on a vertical surface only 1/16" wide. That made it way too fragile, so now I have one long ribbon to cover three bays at a time. They are scored so they will bend at each post. Holds together much better that way and it saves a TON of time! The ones north of the blue line are the diagonal pieces (that make up the diamond shaped criss-crosses) which were 2" x 4"s. That's different from the Giant Dipper which used 4"x 4" lateral cross bracing. It was considered that the Airplane's diagonals may have been only decorative as the 2" x 4"'s don't offer all that much support (according to a civil engineer). The longer ones are scored so I can bend/snap off pieces as I need them. The white areas are where I had to sand off the paint for proper cementing. 1888

Here's what I have to do to get the track properly laid. Yes, I had to snip each bent in to two parts. Fortunately, the full sized real deal has splices all over it's vertical poles, so no one will know....

Here is the very beginning of the catwalk assembly. Next step is painting...THAT is going to be hard because I'm aiming for a weathered grayish look. I don't think the catwalks were ever painted, at least not from what I can find. As of 11/29, I'm still thinking as to how to make the catwalk appear as if most of its paint had worn off.

Here are the bents, all 17, temporarily standing for final checks before stringing them all together.

Here I am standing next to the bents that will make up the first turn, or as we Airplane buffs call, The Bottleneck.

I thought this photo would hold you over until the next big construction shot. Here is a little construction shot of ledger building. I make these when I have only a little time to spare. I get about 4 or 5 per hour produced. Trivia: The difference between the Airplane ledgers and those on the Belmont Giant Dipper, the latter has four connecting "points, looking like a squished "X" (see red arrow). One main horizontal ledger and one superelevated one that supports the track. On the Airplane, the two ledgers only attache at three points so it looks like a "y" rather than an "X" 1665

Just a little update. I've decided I was getting a little too ahead of myself and putting myself under too much self-imposed pressure to get something built. I've found that constantly going back over my plans and compare then to several photos, doing a little reprofiling here and a little rebanking there will yield even better than expected results. Never before have I been such a stickler to detail and accuracy that I would go back and make corrections. Even with the part I've built (and will build over) I discovered a discrepancy of about 1/8 inch in one small area. I'm about to start my THIRD attempt to start building. Stay tuned... 1556

Thanks! Happy Hills 2U

Timothy Cole Total: 8 bents, all temporarily erect (and crooked I know) because I can't wait to see something actually come to form. Next is some paint touch-up, then...I'll let you in on a little secret related to laying track...after that, I duplicate this procedure on 9 more bents and the first curve/bottleneck section will be completed!

Fred Church was a master coaster designer in his day. Here is a rough rendering of his typical joint connections on bents that you can find on the BP Giant Dipper as well as the Airplane. Having hand's on experience with Church's work makes it easier to spot such intricaticities.

And I simply COULDN'T pass up the opportunity for a sneak peek at what they would all look like standing upright. Can anyone guess what part of the Airplane this is? 2717

Voila! We have some bents happening here. The very first bents to come off the assembly line.

A little sanding station helps me remove paint from glue-contact areas.

...and cut

For cutting the smaller pieces that will hold the two up-rights together, I used the construction office to...measure..

Using my vertical bent plan, I cut the shorter post.

Using my Elevation Roll, I snip the post at the tallest point on that particular bent.

So I decided to spice it up a bit. I created a Construction Office. Make cutting, sanding, and painting fun!!!

BORING cutting template I was going to use to cut cross-buck bracing, chords, and ribbons. Did I say BORING? Boring

Finished with my "Elevation Roll". Next time I will measure it.