So you want to put a turntable in. (lots of pics)

The Wiscasset Waterville and Farmington Railway Museum is building a copy of the railroad's original Wiscasset, ME turntable. The original turntable was a 48' wood queen post turntable designed by the Portland Company. Our turntable pit design is a blend of the Wiscasset and Albion turntable pits. Albion was the railroad's northern terminal and had another Portland Company turntable. Except for the excavation work all the labor has been performed by museum volunteers. Our contractor started excavating for the foundation on 7/13/16 and we finished all the site and foundation work 9/1/16.

I'm just copy and pasting my posts off the wwfry forum. The pictures start with the timber delivery and cover up to the present date.

Some pictures of the original Wiscasset turntable. The original turntables did not have a continuous ring rail at the outer edge of the turntable. There is a continuous inner ring rail under the center of the turntable that forms the bearing assembly the turntable spins on. The outer ring rail is only present where tracks connect to the turntable bridge. In the pictures of the Wiscasset turntable the "pit" originally had a timber retaining wall that was later replaced with concrete. The Albion turntable had nothing around the pit area just the ground sloping into the pit area. Our turntable at Sheepscot will have concrete bulkhead with a piece of ring rail in front of the roundhouse and turntable lead area. The rest of the turntable area will be open like the Albion turntable pit.

You can see the outer ring rail ending past the the last track in the foreground.



You can see the wheels holding up the turntable on the inner ring rail in this picture.



The earlier timber retaining wall.



Albion turntable.







3/9/16 Wayne delivered the turntable castings today.





4/27/16 We pulled up track 7 today to make way for the turntable. What's left of track 7 will be realigned to become the turntable lead from the yard.







5/26/16 Douglas fir timbers for the turntable arrived in Sheepscot this morning. We still have some oak timbers coming for the queen posts and some other parts.









6/9/16 Randy and Phil cutting plywood for the concrete forms for the turntable foundation. The steel rods on the trailer are for the turntable and B&SR 67 rebuild.





Jonthan started machining the wheel castings for the turntable.





6/23/16 The concrete form crew has been busy.













Rebar assembled for the center bearing footer.



Oak for the queen post assemblies at the sawmill.



6/24/16 Rebar bent up for the center bearing foundation.



Our shiny new rebar bender.



Sorting timbers out.



6/29/16 Working on the main beams.















Rebar work for the center bearing foundation.











7/2/16 One set of main beams has been stacked up on their sides to be marked and drilled for bolts that hold the beams together.





Cross members are being cut to length.







First batch of cross members had their first coat of wood preservative applied today.



Moving timbers around for cutting.



7/8/16 Rebar plan with the different foundation areas marked.



Rebar panels for the concrete beams that connect the center bearing support and the retaining wall / ring rail support in front of the roundhouse area.



Rebar hoops bent up that tie into the panels above.



Rebar cage for the center bearing done.



The third bundle of rebar the pieces of the left are whats left of the second bundle.



Cutting the last of the cross beams.



Every cross beam is getting three coats of wood preservative along with the main stringers. The turntable won't stay green after a couple months the  wood will weather a shade of brown.



7/9/16 More rebar was cut and bent today. I believe we only have one more set of hoops to bend up.



7/14/16 Excavating for the turntable foundation Wednesday 7/13.









































7/15/16 More excavation pictures from Thursday 7/14.





















7/18/16 The rebar cage for the center bearing was placed in the hole today and work was started on assembling the rest of the rebar. Once all the rebar is in we can put the forms up for the footers and start pouring concrete.





Checking that center bearing rebar cage is the right place.



Starting on the rest of the rebar.





7/20/16 Foundation progress.























7/25/16 The footing was poured this afternoon.



























7/26/15 Hard to see in the pictures but more rebar was added today.





7/27/16 The rebar work for the next concrete pour was finished today and work started on putting up the concrete forms.



8/4/16 More foundation progress.















8/10/15 More foundation progress. The next concrete pour should be the beginning of next week.











8/15/16 Most recent batch of turntable pictures. The forms were finished last week and gravel was placed around the bottom of the forms to keep the forms from shifting during the concrete pour. More gravel was placed in and around the hole to allow the concrete trucks to get closer to the forms. Today the forms were coated with release agent and a bonding agent was applied to the top of the footers. We also started drilling the main beams for bolts today.



























Center bearing wheel being turned.



Drilling the main beams for bolts. Two main beams are bolted together to form one assembly for each side of the turntable bridge.



Completed cross members for the turntable bridge staged in the parking lot.



8/16/16 2nd concrete pour.























8/18/16 Last set of forms being put together today.









Center bearing wheels being machined.





8/24/16 The last concrete pour was done this afternoon.

Last set of forms up waiting on concrete.





Concrete in place.



The crew started pulling forms off the center bearing foundation.



9/1/16 More turntable progress pictures. Drainage and grading work around the turntable should be done this week. Machine work is continuing on the bearing parts and work is progressing on the turntable bridge.































Main beams being drilled for bolts.



Bearing wheels being drilled for grease fittings.





Anchor castings for the inner truss rods have been machined.



Oak being cut for the queen post assemblies.



9/1/16 All of the major earth work and drainage around the turntable foundation was completed today. The ring rail ties were bolted to the foundation today and track seven was relined to serve as the turntable lead.

The last drain pipes going in. This drain is for the water coming off the shop roof.





Bolting down the ring rail ties. The area around the ties was filled in with stone to make walking around in the pit area easier.







Backfilling behind the retaining wall.







Lining track 7 over to the turntable.





Track 7 moved over to feed the turntable.







Overall view of the turntable sight at the end of today.







This picture was taken 7 weeks ago. Not bad progress.