From: noel shelley (noel@shelley1722.freeserve.co.uk)
Date: Wed Dec 01 2004 - 11:06:30 PST
Good evening Gentlemen ,
With reference to railway
gauges as mention by some , The Russians used a 5 Foot gauge , which was
larger than the European standard gauge of 4` 8½" which can be traced back
to the wheel spacing of wheeled vehicle used by the Roman army {MV content }
Brunels , Great Western broad gauge was 7`, an interesting point was the
fact that at this width the coned wheels could not compensate for the
differing radiuses on curves and so caused a lot of wheel and rail wear .
The wheels of railway stock are coned and on a curve move across the rails
so that the inner wheel is on a smaller diameter whilst the outer wheel runs
on a greater one that acts as a diff !
The smallest common gauge in commercial use is 10¼" followed by 15" , 2` is
much used in quarries and on the African continent many huge articulated
locos used this gauge . There are 1000s of miles of 2`6" , Meter & 3`6"
gauge all over the world .
May be of interest Noel
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