12" Guage Wheel Standard

Discuss park gauge trains and large scale miniature railways having track gauges from 8" to 24" gauge and designed at scales of 2" to the foot or greater - whether modeled for personal use, or purpose built for amusement park operation or private railroading.

Moderators: Glenn Brooks, Harold_V

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Topics may include: antique park gauge train restoration, preservation, and history; building new grand scale equipment from scratch; large scale miniature railway construction, maintenance, and safe operation; fallen flags; track, gauge, and equipment standards; grand scale vendor offerings; and, compiling an on-line motive power roster.
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dnevil
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by dnevil »

Hey Mike,

If your various equipment all runs on the WF&P then I don't see any reason to convert it. If IBLS does issue a 12 inch gauge standard it would in no way force anyone to use it. The reason I bring this up now is I've received a couple of requests for standards from people wanting to build 12 inch gauge track and equipment. The only written spec I've seen so far is the WF&P drawing from LSOR.

This thread has been very helpful already. Thanks to all who have contributed.

Daris
Daris Nevil
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EVGEN
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by EVGEN »

It is imperative to develop a standard for a 12 "gauge! For future builders. How quickly can this be done?
For the European region, I would make the standard for the gauge of 10 1/4 ".
Glenn Brooks
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Mike and Dave, et al,

In addition to flange measurements, two Additional measures that builders are always interested in are the overall width of the wheel, and axle diameter. If these two things were included in a 12 gauge standard, it would save new builders a lot of time in the design and construction of their equipment. And in the long run contribute to safety.

While actual diameter is really a function of load carrying capacity, publishing a discussion on 12” axle diameters or even a range of diameters would be very helpful. I could see a sub paragraph devoted to a rule of thumb for determining safe axle diameter based on class of use. For instance my Ottaway axles are 1 1/4” diameter, yet some flimsy, el cheap-O 16” park gauge trucks I recently acquired were originally built with 1/2” round stock or less axles. I guess they are OK for maybe a light weight kiddie train, but I can’t imagine why anyone would build such thing for general use age, unless they didn’t know any better. Hence the value of publishing recommended, or voluntary standards for all the major live steam gauges.

Dave, I do hope you will pursue adding a 12 inch gauge standard to the IBLS wheel standards.

Thanks much,

Glenn
Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
rkcarguy
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by rkcarguy »

As mentioned, that is the issue with different peoples railroads....I don't plan to have anything beyond a 0-6-0 or a 4 axle diesel on my RR, so I can gauge my tracks pretty tight. Someone trying to run a X-8-X, may have to really open up their curves to get it to work. Having enough wheel width is where it gets important in that case so regular locomotives and rolling stock don't "fall in". I wouldn't want anyone to have to re-gauge anything, but if there was a standard it would increase the odds of compatibility between RR's which is never a bad thing.
Personally I feel that 12" gauge is far more stable and useful for hauling people than the popular 7-1/2" gage, which is why I went with that to begin with. Even in full scale, its admitted that a wider gauge would be better with the weight and size of the trains these days, but that there is so much 4'-8-1/2" track in place it would never be able to be all changed. Think about it, it's the width of the track of a Honda Civic under a 10' wide load of up to 300K #'s. Thankfully, we aren't stuck with that!
I am nearing the point of no return on my railroad as I've grooved almost 200 ties at 12.080"(ONLY 1,400 to go lol), so if I need to go wider I'd really like to know ASAP. I can shim my jig and open the gauge up on the rest and use these on the straight portions of the sidings or something. I'm also close to having the router fixture laser cut for my turnouts. I've fattened up the diverging route portion to 12.125" and then have another fixture drawn up for an "adapter piece" that brings the track parallel with the main track after a turnout and returns the gauge to 12.080". These are just strips of plate that are cut to the right radius and width, for me to run my router down each side to groove the row of ties.
rkcarguy
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by rkcarguy »

Good idea on the axle size Glenn, 1/2" is a joke. The interesting part is, that the shear strength of 1/2" steel is plenty strong for quite a lot of load so I wouldn't worry about breakage between the wheel and bearing, but deflection and bending of the axle between the wheels is definitely an issue. Bearing load area decreases and wear will obviously be more rapid as well.
I'd say 5/8" minimum for 7-1/4-7-1/2, 3/4" to 1" for 12", 1" to 1-1/4" for 15", and step up a size if you plan on a gross weight above 1000#'s per rolling stock or locomotive.
My locomotive and riding car are using 1" axles, my flat cars are being built to handle a ton each and will have 1-1/4 axles turned down on the ends to use the same 1" flanged pillow block bearings as the rest of my stuff.
Glenn Brooks
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Hello All,

This is an updated entry. I remeasured the radius of my flanges on drivers and tender wheels, and checked radius of several pieces of 12# rail.

Methodology: used a set of machinist radius gauges to find the best fit to estimate the flange radius and rail head radius.

The 12# rail rail head radius, on both top sides of the head was most closely fitted to 5/32” radius gauge. This several sections of rail are used and could be 75 to 100 years old, but are in excellent condition, with little corrosion or wear patterns.

Flange radius, Ottaway drivers: 5/32” at the root.

Ottaway tender wheel flange radius: 5/32” at the root.

After rechecking the measurements, I am sure 5/32” is the common flange measurement on drivers and 12# rail head. This matches the published cross section of ASME 12# rail.

Glenn

Glenn
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Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
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ALCOSTEAM
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by ALCOSTEAM »

The 12" wheel drawing from the WF&P has George Kiesel's initials on it but I have no idea if he was the originator or if he just redrew from other sources. This is the drawing we used for our 12" gauge wheels.
Glenn Brooks
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by Glenn Brooks »

EvGen,

My apologies, I missed your earlier question regarding size of rail for 12” gauge. The most common rail for 12 to 15” gauge miniature trains here in the US, is 12 pound rail. 8# rail used to be quite common in the early 1900’s. However now, 8# rail is becoming really quite scarce. Probably used past it’s useful life, returned to the scrap yard, etc.

However, 12# rail is still manufactured and widely available used, and new from China steel mills. Usually called 8KG rail, it is exported all over Africa, South Asia and Indian sub continent for mining and timber harvesting, usually in developing countries.

Once in awhile you can find new 4kg rail from Asia. But it is exceedingly rare- you either have to wait a long, long time for a production run, or catch an Asian steel supplier at just the right moment, to order any of this stuff.

Hope this helps.

Glenn
Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
rkcarguy
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by rkcarguy »

Glenn Brooks wrote: Sat Sep 15, 2018 10:19 pm Hello All,

I got a chance to measure my Ottaway flange radius on the drivers, and tender wheels today. Also the drivers on my 1904 Campbell 4-4-0. Also I did a quick measurement of a piece of 12# rail from my rail storage yard.

Methodology: used a set of machinist radius gauges to find the best fit to estimate the flange radius and rail head radius.

The 12# rail rail head radius, on both top sides of the head was most closely fitted to 1/8” radius gauge. This rail is used and could be 75 to 100 years old.

Flange radius, Ottaway and Campbell drivers: 1/16” at the root.

Ottaway tender wheel flange radius: 1/16” at the root.

I’ll re check this again tomorrow. Hopefully during daylight and not in pouring rail, as today.

Frankly I was a little surprised the rail head radius and the flange radius weren’t the same.

Glenn
Interesting, sounds like your wheels would actually like groovy track:)
Glenn Brooks
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Following up on flange radius and rail dimensions. Here is the ASME 12# rail standard for new rail. Shows 5/32” top rail head radius.

This is the curvature that mates to the wheel flange radius.

-G
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Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
Glenn Brooks
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Joined: Mon Nov 10, 2014 1:39 pm
Location: Woodinville, Washington

Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Quck update. Please note, I edited my earlier post regarding drive wheel flange radius to correct my earlier, erroneous flange measurements. The correct flange radius on my Ottaway 4-4-0 is 5/32” . This corresponds exactly with the known, published flange radius of ASME 12# rail.

Glenn
Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
Mike Walsh
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Re: 12" Guage Wheel Standard

Post by Mike Walsh »

I set up the WF&P machine shop with a metric round carbide insert, at the recommendation of a fellow Chaski member. It is close enough (within 0.003") for what we are doing. Our wheels are a bit oversize, but I've found that I am able to hog out the taper and do the radius with this tool. Works pretty good. Just gotta know your limits, which some of the newer guys in the shop have a hard time wrapping their mind around the concept of using a round tool to do a taper and such. Ah, well. They can have it :-)
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