4 feet 8 1/2 inches

The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number.

Why was that gauge used?
Well, because that's the way they built them in England, and English engineers designed the first US railroads.

Why did the English build them like that?
Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the wagon tramways, and that's the gauge they used.

So, why did 'they' use that gauge then?
Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they had used for building wagons, which used that same wheel spacing.

Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing?
Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break more often on some of the old, long distance roads in England . You see, that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So who built those old rutted roads?
Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (including England ) for their legions. Those roads have been used ever since.

And what about the ruts in the roads?
Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match or run the risk of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome , they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing. Therefore the United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot. Bureaucracies live forever.

So the next time you are handed a specification/procedure/process and wonder 'What horse's ass came up with this?', you may be exactly right. Imperial Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the rear ends of two war horses. (Two horses' asses.)

Now, the twist to the story:

When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah . The engineers who designed the SRBs would have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains, and the SRBs had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track, as you now know, is about as wide as two horses' behinds.

So, a major Space Shuttle design feature, of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system, was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass. And you thought being a horse's ass wasn't important? Ancient horse's asses control almost everything and....

CURRENT Horses Asses are controlling everything else

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Originally Posted by Micky Duck

The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number.

Why was that gauge used?
Well, because that's the way they built them in England, and English engineers designed the first US railroads.

Why did the English build them like that?
Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the wagon tramways, and that's the gauge they used.

So, why did 'they' use that gauge then?
Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they had used for building wagons, which used that same wheel spacing.

Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing?
Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break more often on some of the old, long distance roads in England . You see, that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So who built those old rutted roads?
Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (including England ) for their legions. Those roads have been used ever since.

And what about the ruts in the roads?
Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match or run the risk of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome , they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing. Therefore the United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot. Bureaucracies live forever.

So the next time you are handed a specification/procedure/process and wonder 'What horse's ass came up with this?', you may be exactly right. Imperial Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the rear ends of two war horses. (Two horses' asses.)

Now, the twist to the story:

When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah . The engineers who designed the SRBs would have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains, and the SRBs had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track, as you now know, is about as wide as two horses' behinds.

So, a major Space Shuttle design feature, of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system, was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass. And you thought being a horse's ass wasn't important? Ancient horse's asses control almost everything and....

CURRENT Horses Asses are controlling everything else

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you need to have that published !!!

Very amusing

I pinched it off another website....far too good not to share.....horses arse makes the decision...sounds vaugely familiar....

That was cool. :cool:

Romans gave us Miles too, but it's a human, not equine measure.

Mile is from "milli" - a thousand. A thousand paces (one left + one right step) is 1600 metres, 1 mile.

A Roman legionnaire could compel any bystander to carry his equipment for him for one mile, hence the expression of "going a second mile" for someone.

The measurement that has always intrigued me is the "firkin"...too firkin fast/slow...too firkin far...and many others.

Have a look at a map of England, all the towns are about 20 miles from each other.
That as far as a horse could walk in a day.

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Originally Posted by Cordite

Romans gave us Miles too, but it's a human, not equine measure.

Mile is from "milli" - a thousand. A thousand paces (one left + one right step) is 1600 metres, 1 mile.

A Roman legionnaire could compel any bystander to carry his equipment for him for one mile, hence the expression of "going a second mile" for someone.

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and for a bonus brownie point the phrased was made famous where????

Close-ish. There were a number of gauges used until they standardised , much like here. Unfortunately they settled on a stupidly narrow standard gauge here.

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Originally Posted by Micky Duck

and for a bonus brownie point the phrased was made famous where????

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I have the answer, Sir!. Gospel of Matthew, sermon on the mount by God's son. It was along other sayings like turning the other cheek, if someone robs you of your coat, offer him your shirt too, if you're compelled by someone to go with him one mile, go with him two.

Not sure how it relates to the firearms buyback robbery. If Jacinda steals your rifle, give unto her also your toothbrush?

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Originally Posted by gadgetman

Close-ish. There were a number of gauges used until they standardised , much like here. Unfortunately they settled on a stupidly narrow standard gauge here.

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To cope with the twisty hilly landscape in NZ, you can make a tighter bend in the track with narrow gauge.

she wanted your colt ar15 and the ammunition too perhaps..... brownie points duely earned....

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Originally Posted by Finnwolf

To cope with the twisty hilly landscape in NZ, you can make a tighter bend in the track with narrow gauge.

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Engineering wise that makes no sense whatsoever. Narrow gauge on tighter turns would lead to instability. The main thing that would determine the tightness of a turn would be the length of the locomotives between fixed axles and the sideways play that is allowed. The wider the gauge the more play that would be allowed.

Back in the 70's I worked for an outfit that built a large storage warehouse, between the buildings were two sets of rail lines laid that would hold 50 odd wagons, the rail siding was concreted and the first rail wagon shunted in derailed as the concrete had been laid to the wrong side of the wheel flanges...took a lot of cutting and jack hammering to get it right.

Brilliant


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I'll tell you what's stupid. Queensland and Nsw in oz dont have a proper connecting rail link between states as they run different gauges.
If you want to run it by rail it has to be swapped to different rolling stock.

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Originally Posted by Phil_H

It is certainly cheaper constructing tunnels for a narrower gauge....

Cheers
Phil

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The hole for the train is the same size. The gauge is just the gap between the wheels. What makes it cheaper?

Sent from my E6533 using Tapatalk

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Originally Posted by 2post

Have a look at a map of England, all the towns are about 20 miles from each other.
That as far as a horse could walk in a day.

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Nz is very similar

The famous engineer of engineers Brunel designed railways with a broader gauge.

Just think of what better trains we could have nowadays if it had been adopted everywhere. No more walking sideways through a train.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broad-gauge_railway

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Originally Posted by Mauser308

Ahhh, the boogies flex and turn depending on the curve of the track. The actual length of the loco doesn't really make a lot of difference, but the curve radius minimum amounts are a factor of the distance between the rails, the taper of the wheel's face or tyre surface which gives the tracking ability of the wheelsets around the curve (as they slide to the outside the contact diameter adjusts so that the outside wheel is effectively greater diameter and travels faster to make the curve). It's that fact that allows the narrow gauge to have tighter curves. There's a gauge one size narrower in NZ on some of the old tram lines, standard gauge and then the wide gauge for the really big gear out of Siberia and the like...

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The bogies bit is true of modern locos (though the effect would be minimal), but in the day we standardised it was all steam locomotives that had the large fixed drive wheels in the middle, with movable bogies generally fore and aft of those. The rule with narrow gauge was that is was often reserved for lighter gear, where the track could be lighter duty and bent more easily. There are plenty of countries with just as gnarly terrain as us but a more useful gauge.

More rail funfacts; Qld, NSW and Victoria all run different gauges. Widest in Vic, narrowest in Qld. Wider gushed is more expensive to construct but rides better, less swaying and probably better payloads. Australian towns are generally about 60 miles or 100-110 kms apart. The distance a steam train can go before it needs a refill of water and coal in flat country.

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Originally Posted by csmiffy

I'll tell you what's stupid. Queensland and Nsw in oz dont have a proper connecting rail link between states as they run different gauges.
If you want to run it by rail it has to be swapped to different rolling stock.

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I’ve been to the station where those heading from one state to the other had to get out of one train, walk across the platform and get into the other train to continue their journey...

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Originally Posted by Mauser308

Well, to be fair when I went through loco school last year for trainee LE the effect wasn't that minimal. Took me a while to get my head around the 'how' of how it actually works - you need to be looking at the gear to see it. Standing at the back of a wagon in daylight trying to work out why the wheels aren't straight up and down, and then realising that they are but the optical illusion is stuffing your head up is priceless. The EF electric loco's run three bogies of two, the DL diesels run two bogies of three traction motors and those are the ones that make me scratch my head about how they turn corners. There isn't a huge amount holding the bits together, there's a fairly defined limit with the traction rods and radius rods as to how far things can move but the possible or permissible float limit is huge. But it seems to work, so kudos to the Chinese. Now, if they would only build decent steel, switches, and cab surfaces that don't fall apart and go sticky!

Another factor in how tight the curve can be is loco tipping speed, I'm told the curve speed is set at 50% of theoretical tipping speed. Not planning on verifying that either.

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Yes, the tops of the rails are radiused as well to help cope with the moving wheel geometry. We (Railways Courier service which was bought by NZ Post) were on the same frequency as workshop. There were some interesting conversations. Main issue was brake hoses and brakes being applied causing flat spots on the wheels.

We started with a descent gauge here.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canter...ncial_Railways

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Originally Posted by Mauser308

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimu...y_curve_radius

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The sharpest curves tend to be on the narrowest of narrow gauge railways, where almost all the equipment is proportionately smaller.[4]
Steam locomotives

As the need for more powerful (steam) locomotives grew, the need for more driving wheels on a longer, fixed wheelbase grew too. But long wheel bases do not cope well with curves of a small radius. Various types of articulated locomotives (e.g., Mallet, Garratt, and Shay) were devised to avoid having to operate multiple locomotives with multiple crews.

More recent diesel and electric locomotives do not have a wheelbase problem and can easily be operated in multiple with a single crew.

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That's pretty much what I came up with using logical reasoning. I could have just looked it up.

Diesel Electric is a great combo. Diesel generates the efficient power and the electric motors develop amazing torque from zero revs.

Fun, but not actually true.

The tale is a good one, but it’s embellished. There’s a couple of myth busting / fact checking websites that quote this exact text, and then pick it apart with analysis of each of the steps in the story. It’s one of those ones where parts are founded in fact, other parts are maybes and might have beens, and the rest is conjecture. I think Snopes described it as “Mixture” which means it’s part truth, part myth, and then explained why. Worth reading up on, provides plenty of interesting stuff there.

Well that’s killed it, was a nice story.
Did my time as a Fitter in the old NZR Addington Workshops, enjoyed my time at the Ensors Road Loco depot and Addington Loco repair and overhaul workshops but to much of an old mans home for me. Worked on some big arse machinery, was an excellent place to do a trade.

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Originally Posted by 300winmag

Well that’s killed it, was a nice story.
Did my time as a Fitter in the old NZR Addington Workshops, enjoyed my time at the Ensors Road Loco depot and Addington Loco repair and overhaul workshops but to much of an old mans home for me. Worked on some big arse machinery, was an excellent place to do a trade.

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Brother in law told me of his time in loco workshops doing electrical apprenticeship first day on job was told to pick up some big-arsed compacitor and put it on the bench, unit had been charged with a zillion volts, when he picked it up it discharged and put him in bed for a month...staff were told to stop playing that joke on newbies.

I started my apprenticeship when I was 15, certainly had my fair share of practical jokes, some bloody dangerous ones to.