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The Railroads invented time zones.
Answer: True.
This answer is from Ask.com. There were no time zones in the US until trains allowed for travel of hundreds of miles in a day. A railroad engineer named Sir Sandford Fleming invented the Standard Time Zones in 1878 but they were not accepted until 1884.
The US was linked coast to coast when the Transcontinental Railroad was completed on May 10, 1869, at Promontory Point, Utah.
Answer: Not Exactly True.
Actually, a complete and continuous rail connection from the Atlantic to the Pacific was not achieved in 1869. At least two rivers needed to be bridged, the San Joaquin river south of Stockton California and the Missouri river between Council Bluffs, Iowa and Omaha Nebraska. The San Joaquin river bridge was completed by September 1869 however crossing the Missouri river was not completed until 1872. Trains were ferried across the Missouri river for three years. Once this final bridge was completed, there was a 3500-mile continuous railroad connection from New York to California. Also, the joining did not take place at Promontory Point but near by.
May 10, 1869 A Golden Spike discoverlivesteam.com/magazine/108/
Sears got his start selling watches to railroad employees.
Answer: True.
The following is from wikipedia. Richard Warren Sears was a railroad station agent in North Redwood, Minnesota when he received an impressive shipment of watches from a Chicago jeweler which were unwanted by a local jeweler. Sears purchased them, then sold the watches for a considerable profit to other station agents, then ordered more for resale. Soon he started a business selling watches through mail order catalogs. The next year, he moved to Chicago, Illinois where he met Alvah C. Roebuck, who joined him in the business. In 1893, the corporate name became Sears, Roebuck and Co.
Also visit jobshuk.com.
Drive chain "stretch" is caused by excessive tensioning.
Answer: Yes, mostly....
It's not that the side plates are getting longer. Wear is causing each link to be slightly looser and when multiplied by the total number of links, it can add up quickly. The following is about bicycle chain which is a close cousin to the chain most folks use for power transmission in the hobby.
"Cyclists often speak of chain "stretch", as if the side plates of an old chain were pulled out of shape by the repeated stresses of pedaling. This is not actually how chains elongate. The major cause of chain "stretch" is wearing away of the metal where the rivet rotates inside of the bushing (or the "bushing" part of the inside plate) as the chain links flex and straighten as the chain goes onto and off of the sprockets. If you take apart an old, worn-out chain, you can easily see the little notches worn into the sides of the rivets by the inside edges of the bushings. With bushingless chains, the inside edge of the side plate hole that rubs against the rivet has a smooth radius instead of a sharp corner. This probably contributes to the greater durability of bushingless chains."
The above is from the web site sheldonbrown.com The page with our answer can be found at http://sheldonbrown.com/chains.html
John Henry raced against a steam powered hammer and won, only to die with a hammer in his hand.
Answer: Can't say for sure.
A race like this could have easily happened. John Henry was a common name. Exact records of his existence and where exactly this race took place can not be proven as fact. I'll call it "Likely True".
Bisquick was invented in a dinning car kitchen in the 30's by a railroad chief.
True
"Bisquick is a pre-mixed baking product sold by General Mills under their Betty Crocker brand, consisting of flour, shortening, salt, and baking powder (a leavening agent). According to General Mills, Bisquick was born when one of their sales executives met a train dining car chef in 1930 who mixed lard and the dry ingredients for biscuits ahead of time." Thanks to FreeVectorLogos for that bit of info. Check here for details.
Storing a lead acid battery on concrete will cause it to discharge.
False
Perhaps it was true in the old days before battery cases were made of plastic. There is no reason to be afraid to store your locomotive or automobile batteries on a concrete floor. Read about it here.
Walt Disney caused the split between 7.25 and 7.5" gauge in the US.
False
I'm being told that Walt's home railroad was 7-1/6" because that number is (almost) exactly 1/8 of standard gauge. And because of that, Walt was not able to run his equipment at any track other than his own. The split between 7-1/4 and 7-1/2 came earlier. Perhaps around the turn of the (last) century. No one seems to have the definitive answer to that but one explanation centers around "O" scale modelers converting O-scale track to 1/8.
The term 'real McCoy' refers to a type of automatic oiler invented by a black man.
False
For the answer, we look to one of our favorite sites; www.snopes.com
It is unsafe to use brass fittings on live steam.
True (more or less). Certain types of brass can corrode dramatically when used with steam and must be inspected often.
Read the bulletin from O.S. Locomotive Engines.
Leaving a penny on the tracks will derail a train.
False
That's not exactly true. Here's the real story.
The U.S. standard railroad gauge comes from the width of Roman chariots.
False
That's a bogus story that's been making the rounds on the net for years. Here's the real story.
Brass fittings do not need pipe dope or thread sealant?
False
About 87% of the respondents said False, you need pipe dope or sealant.
There
will always be a gap between the peak of one thread and the valley of the other.
This gap will form a spiral channel that will allow liquids and gasses to escape
when pressure is applied. In my experience, it will leak. Also
without sealant, you may not be able to loosen your fitting again when you need
to. Why "chance-it" since we have modern thread sealer compounds?
Jim O'Connor
The following is from
wiki.answers.com
Q. Do you need pipe dope for brass to brass?
A. Yes, it is still a pipe thread. The pipe dope is there to fill in the
gaps in the thread. It is impossible to machine the treads close enough in pipe
to not need something in the threads to make a seal.
You don't agree? Find an expert pipe fitter or an expert on-line and discuss it with them. People that tell you not to use pipe sealant don't do much pipe fitting.
Thanks to wiki.answers.com. Image from mechanicsupport.com