Building an 'O' Scale East Penn Standard Trolley Module
Part 4 - Hanging the Overhead


By Gary Reighn (gary@reighn.com)

Photo 1 shows a dozen line poles and their support blocks cut and ready for installation. For line poles, I use 3/16" diameter solid brass rod. Since these poles are meant to represent plain wooden poles, there is no need to use tubing to create the segmented poles used in many of the cities. I also plan to hang all the overhead with span wires so I will not be building any bracket arm poles (although they can be easily made by using some smaller brass rod and soldering it to the 3/16" poles.) You can obtain the brass rod at your local hobby shop, unless like me the five ones nearest you didn't have any! If that's the case, try your local hardware superstore (in my case it was Home Depot). They had lots of brass and steel rods in all sizes and in economical three foot lengths. I only needed 3 pieces to make the dozen poles for this module. Cost is about $3.25 for a 3' rod at Home Depot circa 2001.)

After cutting the rods to 8" lengths, I drill a #60 (size not critical) hole about 1 1/4" from the top. I use a file to lightly bevel the edges at the top, not so much for prototypical appearance but to avoid catching my clothing on it when working on or running the module. Many folks like to cut the top at an angle to represent the way wooden poles on some lines were shaped. Since the top of the module was made with only 1/4" plywood (and no homasote) I need to give the poles something more substantial for a mounting base. I used a scrap piece of 1x2 lumber and cut it into a dozen pieces each about 2 1/2" long. These blocks are then glued to the underside of the module at the point where each line pole will site. Rather than going to the bother of threading each pole and using washers and nuts to mount them, I simply drill a hole slightly smaller than 3/16" hole and hammer the poles in.


Photo 1

This Page Under Construction... That's as far as I am right now! Stay tuned for more photos and text as construction progresses...

Please send any questions or comments to gary@reighn.com.

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Copyright 2001 by Gary Reighn. All rights reserved.