A Quick History Lesson for the rail minded - with a space twist
I was sent this as a chain email, but I think it has some merit
A Quick History Lesson for the rail minded
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?
Because that's the way they built them in England, and English
expatriates
built the US Railroads.
Why did the English build them like that?
Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built
the
pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used.
Why did "they" use that gauge then?
Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools
that they used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing.
Okay! Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing?
Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would
break
on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because 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 (and
England)
for their legions. The roads have been used ever since.
And the ruts in the roads?
Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to
match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots
were
made for Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter of wheel
spacing..
The United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is
derived
from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot. And
bureaucracies live forever.
So the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's
behind came up with it, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial
Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the back
ends of two war horses.
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 at 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. 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 rear end.
..... and you thought being a HORSE'S REAR END isn't important!
Interesting ...The Roman influence continues , i was watching a doc about Roman engineering ingenuity on SBS a while back , interesting stuff from plumbing works to bridge building to Aqueduct fabrication ,.... amazing stuff
Interesting facts there h0ughy.
It's funny how Australia has 3 mainline guages. At least all the capital cities are now connected by standard guage tracks. But our standard guage won't fit the US trains, they're too fat for our platforms and tunnels! Engineering at it's finest....
wow that email has been around since - ..well maybe as far back as the romans? but it is a beauty I sort of dont understand that about the ruts, as the proper roman roads were paved with cobblestones
I worked in Terry Wogans forest in southern Scotland and they had just found the old roman road to Edinburgh going through it at the time, and it was paved I'm pretty sure - yay for concrete!
...The Roman influence continues , i was watching a doc about Roman engineering ingenuity on SBS a while back , interesting stuff from plumbing works to bridge building to Aqueduct fabrication ,.... amazing stuff
I sort of dont understand that about the ruts, as the proper roman roads were paved with cobblestones 
