7 ¼ verses 7 ½ How did this happen?
Posted: Mon Jun 16, 2008 7:06 pm
There have been a lot of stories about the reason for the gage difference in the United States, This is what I heard.
First off 7 ¼ gauge is the world standard. In the UK, Europe. Australia and the rest of the world the excepted gauge is 7 ¼. You will only find 7 ½ gauge it the USA.
The story goes like this.
In the early fifties Lester Friend (Friends Models) built a Boston and Albany Hudson. It was 1 ½ inch scale and built to 7 ¼ inch gage. The excepted standard for 1 ½ in scale. He got this specifications form Carl Purinton, the founder of the Brotherhood of Live Steamers. Carl explained that in the UK that was the standard for 1 ½ in scale.
Why 7 ¼ I have no clue. The gauge scaled down should be 7 1/16. In any event the gauge was to be 7 ¼. Some time later Seymour Johnson approached Little Engines founder Martin Lewis. Seymour wanted to build a 1 ½ 4-8-4. Mr. Lewis knew that Lester Friend had a 1 ½ locomotive so he wrote to him asking for specifications.
What I heard was that when Mr. Friend answered the letter he “typed” it. Back in the day some typewriters had the ¼ and ½ key on the same key. One needed to use the shift key to type either fraction. I heard it was a typographical error that caused this difference.
One other theory is that Seymour had a 15 inch gauge railroad with quarter scale equipment. Quarter scale is 2X size to 1 ½ in scale. They simply divided it by 2 and came to 7 ½ in gauge. Some time had passed Seymour had the locomotive and I believe the track also had been built so he wasn’t going to change it. Little engines , being one of the only suppliers, with a heavy add campaign advertising in Popular Mechanics and other national magazines promoted 7 ½ gauge. From there it grew.
To further and to the gauge problem
As mentioned Carl founded the IBLS. When Bill Fitt expanded the Live Steam News Letter in the late sixties he added the names of the IBLS secretaries. This helped new interested builders to find a Live Steamer in their area to share ideas with. A great thing.
I’m not sure why but Mr. Fitt decided to publish the so called IBLS Wheel standards.
This standard was developed by the Los Angeles Live Steamers. It was printed in the back pages of the Little Engines Catalog and later in the Railroad Supply Catalog as well.
The standard gave specifications for the wheel profile and gauge for all gauges including 1 inch and ¾ scales. Now this is were the fun really begins.
The 1 in and ¾ in standards are fine. But the 1 ½ inch is another story. The wheel profile is not according to the international standard and the back to back is wrong as well. The back to back for 7 ½ is 7 1/8 . This is fine for that gauge. For the 7 ¼ gauge they just subtracted ¼ inch making it 6 7/8 inch The excepted back to back through out the world is 6 ¾ inch.
When I first got into the hobby in 1969 I started a LE 1 inch pacific. After attending my first meet at NJLS in 1974 I decided to stop that project and start a 1 ½ scale Locomotive. I asked some questions as to the specifications and was told the back to back should be 6 ¾ so I made my locomotive and cars to that standard.
The LALS, now the IBLS standard was published some time in the middle seventies. No one caught the error. It was just assumed that the LALS standard for 7 ¼ was correct.
Lone builders, started building cars and engines to the published spec.
Why wasn’t the eastern clubs contacted for their input? At that time the only clubs that had tracks here in the east for 1 ½ inch were PVLS and NJLS. PLS did not have a 7 ¼ track at that time.
So now we have two different standards for the original standard.
Here in the east there are some 6 ¾ BB cars and engines running. Some clubs here have modified the track to except both standards.
The 1361’s lead truck was built to the 6 ¾ BB std. Other engines that I have built were made the same. The deficit came into play at PVLS this weekend. As mentioned I haven’t been there in 25 years. I had no gauge problems years ago at PVLS.
The back to back dimension only comes in play at switch frogs.
After steaming up Dan and I headed out on the main line to test the equipment before hauling passengers. We negotiated all the switches up by the bays with out incident. After clearing the yards we came across a switch for the new valley division. This division was added a few years ago. The switches up by the bays and in the yards were set to except both BB standards. The new valley division switch was made to the new BB standard. That’s why we had a major derailment. The lead truck picked the frog. The switch is on a down grade so the heavy train pushed the locomotive between the two rails and stopped between the switch. All wheels on the ballast.
The club members and Dan helped to get her back on. Noting bent or broken.
I dropped the lead truck and with the help of Mark and one other guy and believe or not a sledge hammer pushed the wheels out 1/8 in. So much for precision work (CNC) LOL
The big question and I me BIG is why do we have a wheel standard but no track standard. Don’t they go together?
Let’s go a step further. How about car standards and some other safety issues.
With all the worry about law suites and so forth maybe now’s the time to do that.
First off 7 ¼ gauge is the world standard. In the UK, Europe. Australia and the rest of the world the excepted gauge is 7 ¼. You will only find 7 ½ gauge it the USA.
The story goes like this.
In the early fifties Lester Friend (Friends Models) built a Boston and Albany Hudson. It was 1 ½ inch scale and built to 7 ¼ inch gage. The excepted standard for 1 ½ in scale. He got this specifications form Carl Purinton, the founder of the Brotherhood of Live Steamers. Carl explained that in the UK that was the standard for 1 ½ in scale.
Why 7 ¼ I have no clue. The gauge scaled down should be 7 1/16. In any event the gauge was to be 7 ¼. Some time later Seymour Johnson approached Little Engines founder Martin Lewis. Seymour wanted to build a 1 ½ 4-8-4. Mr. Lewis knew that Lester Friend had a 1 ½ locomotive so he wrote to him asking for specifications.
What I heard was that when Mr. Friend answered the letter he “typed” it. Back in the day some typewriters had the ¼ and ½ key on the same key. One needed to use the shift key to type either fraction. I heard it was a typographical error that caused this difference.
One other theory is that Seymour had a 15 inch gauge railroad with quarter scale equipment. Quarter scale is 2X size to 1 ½ in scale. They simply divided it by 2 and came to 7 ½ in gauge. Some time had passed Seymour had the locomotive and I believe the track also had been built so he wasn’t going to change it. Little engines , being one of the only suppliers, with a heavy add campaign advertising in Popular Mechanics and other national magazines promoted 7 ½ gauge. From there it grew.
To further and to the gauge problem
As mentioned Carl founded the IBLS. When Bill Fitt expanded the Live Steam News Letter in the late sixties he added the names of the IBLS secretaries. This helped new interested builders to find a Live Steamer in their area to share ideas with. A great thing.
I’m not sure why but Mr. Fitt decided to publish the so called IBLS Wheel standards.
This standard was developed by the Los Angeles Live Steamers. It was printed in the back pages of the Little Engines Catalog and later in the Railroad Supply Catalog as well.
The standard gave specifications for the wheel profile and gauge for all gauges including 1 inch and ¾ scales. Now this is were the fun really begins.
The 1 in and ¾ in standards are fine. But the 1 ½ inch is another story. The wheel profile is not according to the international standard and the back to back is wrong as well. The back to back for 7 ½ is 7 1/8 . This is fine for that gauge. For the 7 ¼ gauge they just subtracted ¼ inch making it 6 7/8 inch The excepted back to back through out the world is 6 ¾ inch.
When I first got into the hobby in 1969 I started a LE 1 inch pacific. After attending my first meet at NJLS in 1974 I decided to stop that project and start a 1 ½ scale Locomotive. I asked some questions as to the specifications and was told the back to back should be 6 ¾ so I made my locomotive and cars to that standard.
The LALS, now the IBLS standard was published some time in the middle seventies. No one caught the error. It was just assumed that the LALS standard for 7 ¼ was correct.
Lone builders, started building cars and engines to the published spec.
Why wasn’t the eastern clubs contacted for their input? At that time the only clubs that had tracks here in the east for 1 ½ inch were PVLS and NJLS. PLS did not have a 7 ¼ track at that time.
So now we have two different standards for the original standard.
Here in the east there are some 6 ¾ BB cars and engines running. Some clubs here have modified the track to except both standards.
The 1361’s lead truck was built to the 6 ¾ BB std. Other engines that I have built were made the same. The deficit came into play at PVLS this weekend. As mentioned I haven’t been there in 25 years. I had no gauge problems years ago at PVLS.
The back to back dimension only comes in play at switch frogs.
After steaming up Dan and I headed out on the main line to test the equipment before hauling passengers. We negotiated all the switches up by the bays with out incident. After clearing the yards we came across a switch for the new valley division. This division was added a few years ago. The switches up by the bays and in the yards were set to except both BB standards. The new valley division switch was made to the new BB standard. That’s why we had a major derailment. The lead truck picked the frog. The switch is on a down grade so the heavy train pushed the locomotive between the two rails and stopped between the switch. All wheels on the ballast.
The club members and Dan helped to get her back on. Noting bent or broken.
I dropped the lead truck and with the help of Mark and one other guy and believe or not a sledge hammer pushed the wheels out 1/8 in. So much for precision work (CNC) LOL
The big question and I me BIG is why do we have a wheel standard but no track standard. Don’t they go together?
Let’s go a step further. How about car standards and some other safety issues.
With all the worry about law suites and so forth maybe now’s the time to do that.