Three foot six inch gauge railways

The Cape gauge denotes a narrow gauge railroad tracks, where the distance between the rail head inside with exactly 3 1/2 foot or English 42 English inches is measured, which corresponds to 1067 millimeters. The original designation was CAP- track after the initials of Carl Abraham Pihl ​​, who she first applied on a larger scale, and is not causally related to the Cape region in South Africa, although there very many tracks were built in this gauge.

History

Routes with 42 inch gauge already existed in the early days of the railroad, however, limited to short horses and pit lanes.

The first, built by Carl Abraham Pihl ​​in Cape gauge railway was opened on June 23, 1862 haul of Hamar after basic set in Norway. The exporting railway engineer Pihl ​​recognized here that a development of the mountainous and sparsely populated country was unprofitable with standard gauge tracks and put a narrower track width based, which allowed a better adaptation to the terrain. In conjunction with a lightweight design, the construction costs were lower by 25 % compared to standard gauge. By 1880, a total of 970 km kapspurige railways were built in Norway. With the exception of a branch line all of these tracks have been converted to standard gauge 1904-1949. Outside of Norway came the Cape gauge in Europe only occasionally used, such as in southern Sweden, small railways in Russia and at various steam trams in the Netherlands. Also in Cape gauge the tram in Tallinn ( Reval ).

Today the Cape gauge is widespread in southern Africa and extends to Dar es Salaam in Tanzania ( TAZARA ), in Japan ( with the exception of the high-speed lines that were built to standard gauge ), in Taiwan ( with the exception of the high-speed line and the MRT in Taipei, the built in standard gauge were ), Indonesia, Australia (Queensland, Western Australia, Tasmania ), New Zealand and Ecuador. Some trams, including the famous Cable Cars in San Francisco, built in Cape gauge.

The railway on island Sakhalin was umgespurt early 20th century, from 600 mm to Cape gauge; it is to be umgespurt during the connection of the isolated network to the Russian rail network through the still to be built (as 20xx ) Sachalintunnel on the Russian broad gauge.

Use

Due to the dependent of the gauge arc radii equipped with the Cape gauge railways can better adapt to the terrain profile, so that such lines are to be made in comparison with standard- economical.

The performance of the Cape gauge corresponds approximately to the meter gauge. The advantage of lower construction costs is paid in principle with the narrow track widths with the slightly lower axle loads and a lower stability of the vehicles against tipping. Thus, the Cape gauge in heavy and high speed traffic is limited. Compared with European narrow gauge railways, however, some railway companies reach in southern Africa to Cape gauge amazing benefits.

For passenger trains at speeds up to 160 km / h on Cape gauge in Japan, Australia and South Africa go. Considering that on standard gauge railroads in North America 30 t axle load are the rule and is partially driven with up to 35 t Axle Load on industrial lines, it is clear that the European standard of 22.5 tonnes axle load on Cape and meter-gauge routes technically is not a problem. Partly also heavier freight trains there are, therefore, common than the European standard gauge trains, and there are correspondingly powerful locomotives available. The class 25 or 25 of the South African Railways NC eg outperforms most European steam locomotives in mass, force and power and is one of the most powerful steam locomotives outside North America.

A special vehicle adaptation to the Cape gauge (and other narrow gauges ) were throughout Southern Africa and South America spread Garratt steam locomotives. This design made ​​it possible to keep the focus of the locomotives also in a cauldron low, which is all the more important because of the risk of tipping, the narrower is the track gauge.