What if 7ft gauge had become the standard?

[Bernard Lamb]

2 hours ago, Steven B said:

 

The Channel Tunnel "Le Shuttle" trains side load sideways onto standard gauge wagons. Cars, coaches and HGVs all load from the side. BR's Motorail also used side loading. Several dedicated wagons were built such as this one:

https://www.departmentals.com/departmental/96453

Additionally, a number of Mk1 GUV were rebuilt to allow for side loading for the last gasp efforts to keep Motorail alive.

 

British work-shops were turning out locos to a range of gauges in the years that followed the birth of the railways so theoretically there was nothing to stop the first German or French railways for operating a larger gauge from the start - it's not as though there'd be through running from Liverpool-Manchester-Berlin!

 

A more interesting question is why gauges larger than 5'-5'6" never succeeded. Even in the likes of Russia or Australia where you have massive expanses of open space on which to build there's clearly some limiting factor. I'd guess that what we have now is the best compromise between axle loads and cargo volume. There's not much point in having a large volume (available from a larger gauge) to fill if you max out on axle loading.

 

 

 

Steven B.

That idea has never been seriously considered but Calais - Calcutta, 1873 and Berlin - Baghdad, 1907 were serious projects.

I believe that Colvilles used 10' 11" gauge in the Motherwell steel mill at one rime with Barclays supplying 3    0-4-0 tanks. That is the proper broad gauge.

Bernard

[Reorte]

Some are taking an idle "what if?" too seriously here I think, hope they don't do the same with every high quality fictional layout set in a real location - treat the subject like those layouts, rather than "if it could've realistically been different that's what we would have, so these are all the reasons we don't." Nothing wrong with a bit of "given that (however plausible or not it is)..."

 

Anyway whatever the practical benefits or lack thereof is it that implausible to imagination different circumstances under which an early developer could've set a big enough de facto standard that it stuck even if it wasn't necessary?

[298]

Suppose broad gauge had been the norm, what gauge would have been used by 1930s model railway manufacturers, whether or not the constrains of a smaller loading gauge might have had to be considered? 

[Titan]

2 hours ago, Steven B said:

 

There's not much point in having a large volume (available from a larger gauge) to fill if you max out on axle loading.

 

 

Apart from shorter trains, and hence shorter freight loops, shorter platforms and all the associated cost savings from that - how many times has the length of freight trains on standard gauge been limited to how long the freight loops are?

 

[lanchester]

A factor that I don't think has been mentioned yet is axle length. Even on the standard gauge in Victorian times, broken axles (not just crank axles) were distressingly common, and the longer they are the more they flex. I think I am right in saying that on the seven foot gauge, locomotives and perhaps some rolling stock were typically double-framed to give more support to the axles, so whereas you can imagine a seven foot gauge outside framed loco giving more room for larger/additional inside cylinders, in practice I think much of that would be taken up with extra framing?

[The Johnster]

4 hours ago, tomparryharry said:

Hitler had an idea for 3 metre gauge.

 

The ' Breitspurbahn', intended to carry the master race in 200kph comfort between Berlin and Vladivostok.  The loading gauge was enormous even by US standards, and double deck coaches that would have weighed hundreds of tons apeice had accommodation more like that of an ocean liner, with restaurants, gymnasiums, swimming pools and so on.  Steam, electric, and diesel traction were proposed, steam for the Siberian sections where the availability of timber suggested wood firing, presumably by hapless teams of untermench slaves in the stokehold!

 

It was a bit mad even by Hitler's standards, and of course the first pre-requisite, the defeat of the Red Army, was never achieved.  Axle loads would have driven the track into the ground, and ramps for river bridges would have had to have been miles long, indeed, an autobahn overbridge would have probably been over a kilometre.  Bigger is not always better. 

 

I believe a short section of 3metre gauge track was laid preparatory to trials, but the engineers had the sense to make it easily convertable to standard gauge double track. 

[Nearholmer]

17 hours ago, Stubby47 said:

What would locos and rolling stock have looked like at Grouping, Nationalisation, post-60s diesel and modern, current day trains?

Probably, quite a lot of them would have looked narrow gauge, certainly at Grouping, because the high infrastructure cost of 7ft gauge with a proportionate loading gauge (which it didn’t really have in reality) would have led to a fair number of secondary railways being built to 3ft or 3ft 6in, in the same way that a massive metre-gauge secondary network existed in France.

 

By nationalisation, most of the narrow gauge would have shut, and a few bits that did well would have been converted to ‘standard’, leaving a core network of 7ft lines, and a lot less pruning to be done on the 1950s and 1960s.

 

Here’s a picture of an LNER train on the ex-GER, large parts of which were 3ft gauge, because the economy couldn’t support 7ft.

 

 

 

 

[Compound2632]

3 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Here’s a picture of an LNER train on the ex-GER, large parts of which were 3ft gauge, because the economy couldn’t support 7ft.

 

Hudswell Clarke's signwriter was having an off day, then:

 

 

[Embedded link].

[The Johnster]

4 hours ago, Allegheny1600 said:

I was always under the impression (I don’t know where from) that the broad gauge allowed greater running speeds, it was only much later that the Stephenson gauge allowed similar speeds.

Brunel certainly claimed this, and the Iron Dukes were running 70mph timetables in the 1850s, the fastest in the world.  The big driving wheels and space between the frames for big cylinders and wide fireboxes helped, but, not for the last time, the GW sat on it's laurels and never developed the locomotives beyond the Rovers, not much more than an enlargement of the Iron Dukes.  The reports of the Gauge Commission are interesting reading, being much concerned with the transhipment problems and various containerisation efforts to ease them.  There were some revealing statements from engineers; Brunel, when it was pointed out to him that he had built the Taff Vale to standard gauge, stated that he had at the time believed that the standard gauge was more suitable to the tight curvature necessary, but that he had sinced proved this to be an erroneous supposition and that were he building it at the time of the Commission, he would have used the broad gauge.   McConnell, of Bloomer fame and loco superintendent of the LNW's southern section, claimed that his locos had run many times at over 100mph, and while I suppose it is possible that they might have been capable of this, I would not like to have tried it on the track of the day with a loco with effectively no brakes, and the idea of riding in one of the little wooden 4 wheeled carriages boucing along behind is frankly terrifying!

 

Within a fairly wide and overlapping range, there is not actually that much to choose between the Cape gauge,, which had stock about the same size as UK standard gauge, standard gauge, and broad gauge.  The loading gauge, especially height, is more important and arguably more influential on locomotive design, as is the ft/lb weight of the rail and it's consequence on axle loads.  The most important point is that a standard track and loading gauge is maintained across a network, and that wheel profiles, buffing and drawgear, signalling, working methods, platform height, and so on are also compatible across a network.  My generation learned this early when we tried to couple Hornby Dublo stock to Triang, and run it through Triang turnouts.

[Nearholmer]

Ah, but you are showing a picture of one in the earlier livery of the Lowestoft and Beccles Extension Railway, which was, of coursed, taken over by the GER, then grouped into the LNER.

[Nearholmer]

Much of this debate seems to revolve around the 7ft gauge “as was”, but if it had become the standard, all the things that happened would still have happened, engineering-thinking would still have progressed, and after many bridges and tunnels had been enlarged we would now have some very big trains rumbling about. 
 

Imagine not just double-stack containers, but two stacks in a row!

 

Commuter trains would get interesting, because the temptation would be to make them short in length, tall, and fat, but that would pose serious problems about boarding and alighting, and station dwell times, which anyone who has used even RER in Paris will know all about. If the trains were double-deckers, the platforms would need to be too.

 

I’m thinking a lot of Talgo-type trains too, to allow axles to get more perpendicular to the rails, otherwise very large cone-angles on the wheels, leading to terrible hunting.

[Compound2632]

8 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Commuter trains would get interesting, because the temptation would be to make them short in length, tall, and fat, but that would pose serious problems about boarding and alighting, and station dwell times, which anyone who has used even RER in Paris will know all about.

 

Yes, for a moment there I was thinking a model engineering railway-style ride-on train would be the ideal solution for short dwell times, until the platform length and distance to walk to get off the station hit me. 

[Titan]

5 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Much of this debate seems to revolve around the 7ft gauge “as was”, but if it had become the standard, all the things that happened would still have happened, engineering-thinking would still have progressed, and after many bridges and tunnels had been enlarged we would now have some very big trains rumbling about. 
 

Imagine not just double-stack containers, but two stacks in a row!

 

 

Unfortunately not, it requires way more than alterations to bridges and tunnels. Track centers need to be increased to allow trains to pass each other, so embankments and cuttings need to be made wider, stations rebuilt as the platforms would not be wide enough or even non-existent once the required track slewing and trimming had taken place, not to mention all the under bridges that would need to be rebuilt so they are wide enough for the new trains to go over them.  Trying to buy the extra land to do this would be expensive, especially in urban areas - the cost of widening a four or six track main line in London would be astronomical!

[Compound2632]

4 minutes ago, Titan said:

 

Unfortunately not, it requires way more than alterations to bridges and tunnels. Track centers need to be increased to allow trains to pass each other, so embankments and cuttings need to be made wider, stations rebuilt as the platforms would not be wide enough or even non-existent once the required track slewing and trimming had taken place, not to mention all the under bridges that would need to be rebuilt so they are wide enough for the new trains to go over them.  Trying to buy the extra land to do this would be expensive, especially in urban areas - the cost of widening a four or six track main line in London would be astronomical!

 

But the premise could be that the Gauge Commission came down in favour of BG as standard, so only the (significant) mileage of SG built to that date would need widening. The only good thing there is that obtaining the land would be much easier than you are postulating.

[Stubby47]

4 minutes ago, Titan said:

 

Unfortunately not, it requires way more than alterations to bridges and tunnels. Track centers need to be increased to allow trains to pass each other, so embankments and cuttings need to be made wider, stations rebuilt as the platforms would not be wide enough or even non-existent once the required track slewing and trimming had taken place, not to mention all the under bridges that would need to be rebuilt so they are wide enough for the new trains to go over them.  Trying to buy the extra land to do this would be expensive, especially in urban areas - the cost of widening a four or six track main line in London would be astronomical!

 

That's assuming that the rest of the country had already chosen 4 ft 8.5" as the gauge - but what if they had chosen 7ft from the outset ?

[Curlew]

One thought that occurs to me is - did the broad gauge loading gauge allow room for outside cylinders?  Might have limited designs to inside cylinder locos, if not?

[Compound2632]

27 minutes ago, Curlew said:

One thought that occurs to me is - did the broad gauge loading gauge allow room for outside cylinders?  Might have limited designs to inside cylinder locos, if not?

 

Plenty of room for inside cylinders! S.W. Johnson is said to have said that he wished the Irish 5'3" gauge was the standard gauge in Britain, as the extra room between the frames would allow for larger bearing surfaces and beefier crank axles. After Kirtley's 800 Class 2-4-0s had been rebuilt, they had essentially the same dimensions as Johnson's standard 2-4-0s - same boiler, cylinder dimensions etc. - but were the better engines and remained popular with the drivers. Ahrons attributed this to their outside frames, which enabled the cylinder centres to be 2" further apart, and consequently larger volume in the passages in the slide valves, that were between the cylinders.

[tomparryharry]

Cape gauge (3'6") is still prevalent in places like Australia, New Zealand, and of course, Africa.  As we know, the 'Gan' in Australia is now standard gauge. Some of the Australian railways had 5'3" gauge, but I'll just check my 1935 locomotive engineers book...  yep, there it is, Australia, Ireland, and.. Brazil. I didn't know that.

[Adam88]

 

[Curlew]

13 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

Plenty of room for inside cylinders! S.W. Johnson is said to have said that he wished the Irish 5'3" gauge was the standard gauge in Britain, as the extra room between the frames would allow for larger bearing surfaces and beefier crank axles. After Kirtley's 800 Class 2-4-0s had been rebuilt, they had essentially the same dimensions as Johnson's standard 2-4-0s - same boiler, cylinder dimensions etc. - but were the better engines and remained popular with the drivers. Ahrons attributed this to their outside frames, which enabled the cylinder centres to be 2" further apart, and consequently larger volume in the passages in the slide valves, that were between the cylinders.

I appreciate that, but outside cylinders and outside valve gear became the fashion for modern steam locos. Just wondering if there would be as much room for these as with standard gauge locos, which might have had (I am only guessing) more space outside the wheels without fouling the loading gauge.

[009 micro modeller]

I tend to agree with those who’ve posted so far saying that some branch and secondary lines would have probably used something like 3’ or 3’ 6” if 7’ had become the standard. This would make sense, if you think about some of the colonial railways that used 3’ 6” or metre gauge because it was cheaper, and didn’t the GWR have some standard gauge feeders even prior to giving up on broad gauge? I suspect these might have used a narrower gauge if the possibility of linking to other standard gauge lines was unimportant.

 

Remember there were other gauges in contention too - we could have equally ended up with a situation where we had 5’ in East Anglia, as iirc that’s what the Eastern Counties Railway originally used. In Scotland I think both 4’ 6” and 5’ 6” were used early on, though I’m not sure if either dominated in specific regions in the way that 7’ did in the west or 5’ could have done in the ECR/GER area. In North Wales further expansion of the Ffestiniog and related lines (especially if the Ffestiniog & Blaenau had remained NG) might have given us a substantial regional 2’ gauge network, and at one stage there were plans to join up the Corris, Talyllyn and Plynlimon & Hafan railways to create a similar network in Mid Wales, but 2’ 3” gauge.

 

I suppose you’d also have to consider whether a more devolved government structure at the time would have resulted in the different nations and regions choosing their own gauges but perhaps with a core intercity network to a shared gauge, a bit like Australia.

 

Later in railway history something similar could have happened with electrification. Just as we now have a north/south divide around London with third rail on the Southern Region and mostly AC overhead elsewhere, if the Great Eastern and Woodhead 1500V DC electrification had been retained and got more entrenched we could have ended up with something of an east/west divide in other parts of the country. But that’s a bit too far off topic.

 

4 hours ago, Bernard Lamb said:

I believe that Colvilles used 10' 11" gauge in the Motherwell steel mill at one rime with Barclays supplying 3    0-4-0 tanks. That is the proper broad gauge.

 

I’ve always been intrigued by this. Are there any photos of it?

[Pacific231G]

2 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Much of this debate seems to revolve around the 7ft gauge “as was”, but if it had become the standard, all the things that happened would still have happened, engineering-thinking would still have progressed, and after many bridges and tunnels had been enlarged we would now have some very big trains rumbling about. 
 

Imagine not just double-stack containers, but two stacks in a row!

 

Commuter trains would get interesting, because the temptation would be to make them short in length, tall, and fat, but that would pose serious problems about boarding and alighting, and station dwell times, which anyone who has used even RER in Paris will know all about. If the trains were double-deckers, the platforms would need to be too.

 

I’m thinking a lot of Talgo-type trains too, to allow axles to get more perpendicular to the rails, otherwise very large cone-angles on the wheels, leading to terrible hunting.

Sadly probably not.  Brunel's main purpose with the wider  7ft was to give greater stability at high speeds*  and, though the GWR's loading gauge was wider than its contemporaries and indeed, at 11ft 6ins ten inches wider than the 10ft 8 in norm of US Railroads, it was never intended to exploit the track gauge with a correspondingly wide loading gauge.  By the time a fair number of BG railways had been built, their loadign gauge would have set the standard for all future railways as happened with Britain's SG railways.

It's interesting that the GWR's loading gauge was actuallly slightly narrower than the 12ft max width of passenger trains on the Indian sub-continent's 5ft 6in gauge though for goods wagons they seem to have settles on the same 10ft 8ins as N. America. 

Had the 7ft (or even the 5ft 6in) gauge been adopted as Britain's Standard Gauge I think the extra construction costs would have led either to a lot fewer railways  getting built or, more likely and as in India and to some extent in the USA, secondary railways being built on three foot or metre gauge and probably getting closed a lot earlier - as happened in N. America and with most of France's metre gauge secondary network- thanks to the costs of transhipment. 

 

*(It's worth looking at how Thomas Crampton, who'd worked for Gooch, sought to achieve the same stability and speed for "standard" gauge. 

**( At 11ft 6ins The GWR's  BG loading gauge was also fourteen inches wider than the normal UIC 10ft 4ins and muich wider than the 9ft-9ft 3ins of Britain's other SG railways- Thanks to its BG heritage the GWR was able to have an SG loading gauge of 9ft 8ins) , 

Edited September 7, 2021 by Pacific231G

[Bernard Lamb]

9 minutes ago, 009 micro modeller said:

 

 

 

 

I’ve always been intrigued by this. Are there any photos of it?

I have never seen a photograph but I have seen a sketch. The boiler and tanks seem to be a normal size width wise and there are wing plates that stretch out to the frames and there are springs for the wheels above these frames. The bunker also appears to be of a standard width but behind this is a full width back plate. I presume that this sturdy structure was to afford some protection to the crew from the hot metal that the loco pulled. The wheels were shielded by flaps. Or were in later days when one was converted to 9' 0" gauge when at Glengarnock.

Bernard

[009 micro modeller]

7 minutes ago, Bernard Lamb said:

when one was converted to 9' 0" gauge when at Glengarnock.

 

Was there another broad gauge line there then? And why didn’t it use the same gauge?

[Curlew]

This table is useful, comparing GWR broad gauge dimensions with other lines https://www.devboats.co.uk/gwdrawings/loadinggauges.php

 

It suggests that the space available between the platform edge and the outside the wheels was about the same as standard gauge - so the same space for outside cyls and valve gear if required.