Märklin H0 modular Bridge with Railing Rail-C 180mm Straight Element (multi-part) / Märklin H0 modulare Brücke mit GeländervGleis-C 180mm Element gerade (mehrteilig)

Motivation

When building a temporary model railway bridge or ramp, you need pillars with various sizes.
Using Lego for this purpose did not look too realistic.
For this reason I designed a pluggable model railway pillar system, that allows you to create any pillar height you need.

For a more realistic look of a railway bridge, I designed a rail element for the straight Rail-C 172mm/188mm rails.
The bridge element has a paved pathway on both sides of the railway track ... and this version also provides additional railings on both sides of the rail support element.
The elements fit on top of the modular Bridge pillar system and can be connected with snap-in-connectors.

The design leaves enough tolerance for the changing slopes needed for the bridge ramps.

The Märklin Rail-C system is intended to be used with for use with our design.

But why a 180mm rail support element?

Right, there is no matching length of a straight Rail-C element.
The reason is rather an aesthetic one:
When building longer straight bridge with the available 172mm/188mm support elements to get the 360mm steps, the distances of the pillars are not evenly distributed over the straight bridge segment.
Using two 180mm rail support elements results in evenly distributed pillar distances over the bridge span.
But you need to consider, that the rail slope only can change on those pillars, where support element joint and Rail-C joint are on the identical position.

Print

Printed with prusament PLA (Gentleman's Grey)
To build a complete ramp or bridge with ramps, you need quite a number of pillars and rail elements.
For one complete straight modular bridge Rail-C 180mm support element (multi part) you need to print the following components:
  1x H0_Bruecke_gerade_180mm_Basis_v00.stl (base element)
     (support:                  not required)
     (brim:                       not required for satin or smooth sheet)
     (print orientation:   upright)
     (colour:                    Gentleman's Grey)

  2x H0_Bruecke_gerade_180mm_Gelaender_v04.stl (paveway railing left/right) 
     (support:                  not required)
     (brim:                       not required)
     (print orientation:   side facing downwards, smooth or satin metal sheet)
     (colour:                    Gentleman's Grey)

  2x H0_Bruecke_gerade_180mm_AbdeckungGelaender_v01d.stl (paveway left/right) 
     (support:                  not required)
     (brim:                       not required)
     (print orientation:   top face facing downwards, structured metal sheet)
     (colour:                    Grey)

  option (paveway without railing):
     H0_Bruecke_gerade_180mm_Abdeckung_v00.stl (paveway left/right) 
     (support:                  not required)
     (brim:                       not required)
     (print orientation:   top face facing downwards, structured metal sheet)
     (colour:                    Grey)

  2x H0_Bruecke_Verbinder_v01.stl (snap-in-connector)
     (support:                  not required)
     (brim:                       not required for satin or smooth sheet)
     (print orientation:   left or right side)
     (colour:                    Gentleman's Grey) 

Assembly

[Straight Rail-C 180mm Support Element complete]
The straight Rail-C 180mm rail support base element is printed as one part.
Then you need to place the paveway parts in the top side of the base element (left and right).
Simply place the paveway parts (left+right) in their related positions on the base element and carefully push in the snap hooks. Take care that the slot and openings for the railing face outwards.
(the paveway parts are identical and do fit into their related position in any orientation with hooks facing down)

Now push in the railings:

This gives a nice impression of a bridge construction with paved walkways and railing left and right of the railway track. 

The snap-in-connectors go into the small openings (left+right) at the ends of the rail support element.
The connected rail support elements fit on top of the pillar system.

For a bridge with 360mm span, you get an equal pillar distance of 180mm using two bridge elements.
For the 360mm length of the rail track, simply combine a straight 172mm and a straight 188mm Rail-C element. 
But you have to use a constant rail slope over the complete 360mm-segment, as the middle pillar position does not match the joint position of the Rail-C tracks.
The Märklin straight Rail-C elements 172mm+188mm are simply placed in the center position.


Play & Enjoy!!!