train rails width

[Anonymous]

North and south america have standard rail width of 4ft 8and a half inches. How did this odd width come be and is it standard world wide?

[Modelcar]

....No it is not completely world standard. Do a search on the subject ...{for your question}, and I believe you will find many, posts on the subject that might help. I'm referring to the search bar at the top of this page.

[Ziggy]

Well, believe it or not, the standard 4'8.5" came from the romans. The chariots were built with that wheel width. The gauge stayed the same down through settlers wagons that traveled west, so the wheels wouldn't be streesed trying to ride out of the ruts that where created... then used by the railroads.

[tree68]

The Snopes Urban Legend page covers track gauge pretty well.

[Kevin C. Smith]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Ziggy

Well, believe it or not, the standard 4'8.5" came from the romans. The chariots were built with that wheel width. The gauge stayed the same down through settlers wagons that traveled west, so the wheels wouldn't be streesed trying to ride out of the ruts that where created... then used by the railroads.

Yes, the chariots (and regular two-wheel carts) had wheels of appoximately that width. The simplest design for a cart would be an axel with two wheels. The harness poles would be laid across the axel and extend forward to the harnesses. While the length of the wagon bed itself would vary easily, the width could not. Too narrow and the horse couldn't fit, too wide and the harnesses wouldn't connect.

So, the modern "standard" track guage was decided by some horse's...

Hmm. Better stop right there.

[mersenne6]

The roman horse cart legend is fun but not true - check urban legends using Google. As far as I know the oldest mil-spec still in use is the practice of stepping off using the left foot - the earliest record of this comes from the Egyptian armies and we are still doing it today.

[caseykkkk]

So how come some English rail road companies used a six foot guage in the early 1800's i.e. Isambard Kingdom Brunnel?

[TomDiehl]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Ziggy

Well, believe it or not, the standard 4'8.5" came from the romans. The chariots were built with that wheel width. The gauge stayed the same down through settlers wagons that traveled west, so the wheels wouldn't be streesed trying to ride out of the ruts that where created... then used by the railroads.

I don't believe it. The biggest flaw in this colorful story is that standard gauge didn't exist until the building of the transcontinental railroad. By that time, railroad cars were being built by companies that specialized in that, rather than carriage makers like back in the 1830's. The carriage maker's part is the link that people make to try to connect this story to fact. The wagon wheel track wasn't even as standardized as the railroads, and it took to the beginning of the 20th century for most railroads to fully conform to standard gauge.

[martin.knoepfel]

The railroad from Stockton to Darlington (1825) was built with standard gauge. I have heard, they chose this gauge because the coal-wagons in the mines run on "standard-gauge"-rail. Otherwise,, you would have to transload. In the early 19th century, the Stephensons (father and son) had practically a monopoly on building steam-engines. They were the Microsoft of then. The railroads had to buy the engines the Stephensons built, and they were standard-gauge. In Britain, standard-gauge was established by act of parliament. The Great Western had to change from broad to standard gauge.

[stmtrolleyguy]

Here's my take on this legend. I don't think the chariot is a direct connection, but there is a link. The 6 foot guage was probably just an arbitrary number. For the technology of the time, they might have though a wider railroad would be better suited to carry freight, or could carry a heavier load. This is the way I see out "settling" on standard guage.

Chariots did indeed make ruts in the road, so a standard size was created. This size spread to England, and eventually, over here to wagons in the United States. Early railroads often ran near cities, or even in city streets (there are loads of laws requiring horsemen to lead the train so as not to scare horses with the steam locomotive.) The romans had trouble with the ruts in the road, divets going down into the road. Well, think of rails as raised ruts, coming out of the road. I think that the same size of the guage meant that cariage wheels would ride along the top of the rail should they happen to line up, instead of falling in, or getting stuck (think about a highrail truck). Wider rails could get a cariage stuck between them, and narrower rails could make it hard for the cariage to pull off to the side.

Refering back to my origianal comment, 6 feet was probably too broad a guage for the railroad. It took too wide a swath of land, and any bridges would be expensive. The 4 foot 8.5 inch size was a good match for the technology (most railroads were within a foot of that size, either wider, or narrower, but still the same general size) The earliest rail vehicles were horse-drawn rail cars for passengers in the 1830s, because the rails were smoother than the cobblestones. Street runnig like this supports the view that the wagon wheels wouldn't get hung up on the rails, and the "standard" guage therefore became standard in many cities.

It is true that standard guage wasn't standardized until after the civil war, but I believe that there is some truth to the roman chariot myth. It's not 100% accurate, and I don't think it was intentional, but I do see a link hidden within it.

[CSXrules4eva]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Ziggy

Well, believe it or not, the standard 4'8.5" came from the romans. The chariots were built with that wheel width. The gauge stayed the same down through settlers wagons that traveled west, so the wheels wouldn't be streesed trying to ride out of the ruts that where created... then used by the railroads.

Took the words right out of my mouth. [:D] A while back I was told that back in the mid 1800s railroads didn't really have a set standard gaudge for rail. Different railroads used different gaudges. I was also told that back in the "day" many railroads didn't want to operate their trains over other railroad's tracks, that is why today there are so many "redundant" lines now in abandonment.

[stmtrolleyguy]

A few more words :
After having re-read the Snopes article, they may state that the legend is indeed false, although many of the reasons that they give are completely irreleivant, and in some cases wrong.

One of the quotes :
"It is rather inaccurate to claim that "US railroads were built by English expatriates," but it is fair to say that since the English started to develop railroads slightly ahead of the Americans, some U.S. railroads used equipment purchased from English manufacturers, thus necessitating that the rails on which that equipment ran be the same size in both countries:"

This may be true, but within a few years of growth, locomotives were ordered for a certain guage. Unless the difference was more than a foot or so, the only difference would be too large a locomotive on too small a track. The width of the axles isn't necisarily connected to the width of the rails. You can order the locomotive for the width that you want. Sometimes the width was determined by the locomotive, but merely because at the time, locomotives were rare, delicate machines, and it was easier to adadpt to the locomotive.

I'd put money on the fact that railroad tracks interfered with cariage wheels, so they made the rails the same width as the cariages, and that width continued just because it was what they knew and used.