"We've always done it that way"

[Skorixor]

Does the statement, "We've always done it that way" ring any bells? ..



Railroads

The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used?

Because that's the way they built them in England, and English expatriates built the US Railroads.

Why did the English 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 that 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 have that particular odd wheel spacing?

Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So who built those old rutted roads?

Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (and England) for their legions. The roads have been used ever since.

And the ruts in the roads?

Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.





The United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot. And bureaucracies livve forever. So the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's ass came up with it, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the back ends of two war horses.





Now the twist to the story...

When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory at Utah. The engineers who designed the SRBs would have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The SRBs had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track, as you now know, is about as wide as two horses' behinds.


So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass.

..... and you thought being a HORSE'S ASS wasn't important!

[Lok'i Vidaar]

Very Very Insightful!

Great Story Man!!!

I enjoyed reading every bit of it, (that makes me a bit of a geek doesn't it, oh wait... Star Wars, Right :P )

[Jabe Adaks]

Since today is April Fool's I am not sure I buy it. Althought its all very plausible.

Jabe

[Skorixor]

nope, not an april fools day joke, and I posted it yesterday

[Hashum]

I love it, that was great. Next time an auditor gives me crap for doing something the way it's always been done I'm using that story.

[Ekade]

I saw that in an email a few years back.. I foind it fascinating.

They presented it in a different order...

First they told us the width of the shuttle booster, then they went back in time explaing the reasons as they went.

The punch line was a little better too. But thanks for posting this.. this came up in a conversation I had with my dad. I've been wanting to email him the actual text.