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Bcbulbchap t1_iyjbccg wrote

I might be wrong, but I imagine it would be reasonable easy to achieve. All they needed to do (presumably), was to move the existing rails to comply with the smaller gauge.

In today’s budget floundering world, we would still do this, but we would rip up the old tracks for scrap first, before relaying with new.

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1859 OP t1_iyjdigv wrote

Their process was pretty neat. They decided that the western-most or northern-most rail was the one to be moved in, and left the other rail as-is. Workers hammered the new spikes ahead of time, three inches inward from the rail to be moved. On the big day, teams used a big caliper called a rail gauge (very creative) that spaced the rails to the exact width of the new gauge. After moving the rail, a few hits with the sledgehammer was all that was needed to put it into place. Then they slid the rail gauge to the next section of track and started the process again.

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koolaideprived t1_iyjxmgr wrote

Also interesting is that it is ok if they are just a bit over standard gauge, but bad if they are under, so they erred on the too wide side.

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Bcbulbchap t1_iyjdsdv wrote

Yes, I thought they’d do it like this - very simple.

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koolaideprived t1_iyjxgtt wrote

It would be a pain in the ass compared to the old days. You couldn't pre-spike because rail on wooden ties ride on tie plates, which you couldn't place until the old one is removed. Many sections of rail also use concrete ties, which have pre installed anchors for tie clips that secure the rail to the tie, meaning you would have to replace every concrete tie. Ribbon rail means you can't do small sections, youbhave to completely free the rail several yards ahead of your work and pull it over with machine assistance, instead of just picking up a 25ft section of jointed rail.

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Bcbulbchap t1_iyk1hrt wrote

Exactly my point…👍

No wonder major (and even relatively minor) construction projects are so time consuming and expensive.

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