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We ended up with a three-brick-tall gap that we had to fill between them, but couldn’t easily access, because both above and below it we’d already built strong structures. ![]() However, as we came to move the bridge’s deck into place, we realized we had a bit of a problem the deck had to slot in from below the level of the pillars, while the arch had been built up to meet that same level. Christian filled and reinforced inside the arch, doing well especially at the pillar sides to give us rock-solid foundations. I mostly relied on “eyeball math” to accomplish the proper curvature, here, and I do think the arch looks a little flattened as a result. So midway up, we turned to stacked plates, each layer protruding forth as a corbel on which another sat. It was impossible to make an arched shape entirely from slopes, anyway, especially at the width we had to accomplish. The arch of the bridge was difficult to achieve, given the limited assortment of slopes available in the LEGO vocabulary. There are three major, structural components to our bridge, each of which was designed to provide a degree of strength to our roadway: the arch, the beam, and the truss system. By putting these two elements together, we ended up with a cool and dynamic-looking structure. Above, the trussed supports were constructed almost entirely with Technic pieces. Below, the stone arch was built mostly from traditional LEGO shapes like bricks, plates, and slopes. We also-mostly inadvertently-reinforced dichotomy on the bridge by the types of elements we used above and below the line of the deck. First, many of the Technic elements we needed to use came in this color second, yellow made for a vibrant contrast with the earth tones of the arch and third, none of the other teams were using yellow as a primary color. Yellow felt like the best choice for us for a few reasons. So, we employed a motley mix of tans and greys to build up the bridge’s stony lower half, and settled on bright yellow for the trusses. We wanted to highlight the old/new dichotomy we’d settled on through color. It gave a bit of storytelling justification to our unorthodox choice to include two support mechanisms. We envisioned this bridge as telling a similar story, starring an aging stone arch bridge getting retrofitted with a more modern, trussed reinforcement. One of the core themes we explored in that build was about the transition from old to new, of refurbishing older structures towards newer purposes. The rule about leaving holes in the top of the bridge through which we could load weights-as well as, I’ll admit, a shortness on time!-unfortunately precluded Christian and me from connecting our two truss systems together as much as we would have liked.Ĭhristian and I saw our build for this challenge almost like a sequel to our Mega City model from the previous week. ![]() The vertical clearance we had to achieve led us to creating enormous triangles. The 12” clearance rule, in its turn, determined the size of our trusses up above. ![]() This necessity guided us towards building an arch as the lower support structure of our bridge. Consequently, any road we were going to make had to be supported, at least in part, from beneath the top lip of the pillars. While it would have been easier by far to build our bridge deck directly on top of these pillars, and use the pillars’ lower support advantageously, the rules of the challenge precluded us from taking this route. ![]() The roadway of our finished bridge had to end up completely level with the surface of the two pillars.įor Christian and me, the toughest of these rules to contend with was the restriction imposed on the pillars’ top build surfaces, which were limited to those 4-stud-thick strips on either side. We needed to leave at least 8”x8” (20x20cm) gaps from above, so that we’d be able to load weight on. We were not allowed to build more than 4 studs in from each edge of the roadway in other words, we had to leave the roadway unobstructed, except for skinny guard rails on either side.Īnything that we built up and over the roadway had to have a 12” (30cm) clearance below it. We were not allowed to build straight across from one lower support to the other we had to arch or angle up to the roadway. All participating bridges needed to adhere to these guidelines: Aside from the obvious limitation of time placed upon us, we were also given another few restrictions and standards. These formed two sides of the chasm across which we were required to build a bridge. In this week’s build, every team was presented with the same set of tall, black pillars.
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