[Milsurplus] Mil Spec

[Joe Foley]

Just to confuse the issue,........ well, ok, to kick
another beehive.

The standard in New York State for rails WAS 6 feet
between rails.  They had to revise that to the
narrower gauge in order to accomodate the other
states' rail traffic.  

I wonder what would have happened if,.........

Joe

PS, Now, what was it that determined the diameter of
the booster rockets on the Space Shuttle?  Two horses
asses?




--- Lloyd <kk7iz@cox.net> wrote:
> Couldn't resist adding this
> 
> HOW MIL SPEC LIVES FOREVER
> The U.S Standard railroad gauge (distance between
> rails) is 4 feet 8 �
> inches. That's an exceedingly odd number. Why was
> that gauge used? Because
> that's the way they built them in England, and the
> U.S. railroads were built
> by English expatriates.
> 
> Why did the English people 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 this 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 use that odd wheel spacing?
> Well, if they tried to
> use any other spacing the wagons would break on some
> of the old long
> distance roads, because that's the spacing of the
> wheel ruts.
> 
> So who built these old rutted roads? The first long
> distance roads in Europe
> were built by Imperial Rome for the benefit of their
> Legions. The roads have
> been used ever since. And the ruts? The initial
> ruts, which everyone else
> had to match for fear of destroying their wagons,
> were first made by Roman
> war chariots. Since the chariots were made for or by
> Imperial Rome, they
> were all alike in the manner of wheel spacing.
> 
> Thus we have the answer to the original question.
> The United States Standard
> Railroad Gauge of 4 feet, 8 � inches derives from
> the original
> specifications of an Imperial Roman war chariot.
> Specs and bureaucracies
> live forever.
> 
> So the next time you are handed a specification and
> wonder what horses ass
> came up with it, you may be exactly right, because
> the Imperial Roman war
> chariots were made to be just wide enough to
> accommodate the back-ends of
> two war horses.
> 
> 
> 
> Lloyd Godsey  KK7IZ
> 1315 N. Udall Circle
> Mesa, Az  85203
> 
> 1-480-620-7145 (cell)
> 
> Please visit my web page
> http://members.cox.net/kk7iz/kk7iz/index.htm
> 
> kk7iz@cox.net
> 
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