Telegraph poles

[rg1]

How tall would a telegraph pole be in 

Thanks
Rob

[galway]

See this link http://www.ngaugeforum.co.uk/SMFN/index.php?topic=3125.msg34722#msg34722

[Mustermark]

I would say about 25-30 feet high, so approx 5-6cm.

They ought to be as high as (or just higher than) the eaves on a house so that the phone wires would clear the street and join the box just below the eaves, so you can also match them against your buildings rather than go for a prescribed height.

Hope that helps.

[kiwi1941]

How tall would a telegraph pole be in  Thanks Rob

If you are enquiring about railside rather than street poles they varied in height and design a great deal. Tthere' s a quite useful article in British Railway Modelling November 2006 pp40-43. If you can't locate a copy I could send a copy of mine from New Zealand if you pm me. HTH, Brian

[rg1]

Thanks for the advice guys, much appreciated.

rob

[Zunnan]

The poles I work off most commonly are roadside telephone poles that are 9m (29ft 6in, 59mm), 10m (33ft, 66mm) and 11m (36ft, 72mm) in height. There are a good number of railside poles that I've had to climb that are on disused routes that have been taken over by us that are as little as 15ft and as much as 60ft in height on a spliced pole (bloody scary to climb!). A point to remember is that the overall pole lengths are given from root to top, and that 5-6ft of the poles quoted height is actually buried, so for a 10m (33ft) pole that means the top is normally 27-28ft (54-56mm) above ground. If you have the chance, have a look at the size of the railside poles at Quorn & Woodhouse station on the GCR where they carried the telegraph route over the road bridge; those poles are monsterous!

[fisherman]

My  Ratio  poles measure 60 mm  so,  allowing  for   10 mm to   be  buried  in  the  layout, this  makes  them  about  25 ft ground  to  top.

[Mustermark]

Agreed.  Just to clarify, my estimate of 25-30 feet was for what shows above the ground!

[fisherman]

and  sunk  lower  @ the  back  of  the  layout  to  force  the  perspective....

or  was it  just  lack  of  measuring  how   far  in  I pushed  each pole...

[Zunnan]

If you want to get an idea of what you are looking at, and exactly how tall it is, there is an engraving on the majority of poles used for telephony cut into the wood at roughly chest height to the average person; this is known as the 'three meter mark', and as its moniker suggests, it is 3 meters from the base of the pole. It tells you several things:

1, the horizontal line is a 3m datum line indicating the depth that the pole is sunk into the ground.
2, height and gauge. Modern poles are metric while older poles are in feet but the gauges are the same. As noted in my earlier post, telephone poles come in 9m, 10m and 11m lengths most commonly. Gauges used are Light, Medium, Stout, and this relates to how broad the pole is with stout being a thick chunky great thing to light being a toothpick that you really don't want to be climbing up! On the marker you will see the pole specified as, for example; a 10M signifying a medium gauge 10m pole.
3, the year of preservation, usually the last two digits of the year so a 91 would have been treated in 1991 but may not have been planted until 1992.
4, Makers mark and wood type. Don't ask me, I don't pay attention to these as they have little bearing on safety in climbing the pole

Now, in looking at trackside telegraph poles in old photos I would say that the lowest wire is generally about roof height to a train, which is around 14 feet up. See HERE and HERE for examples showing what I mean. The uppermost wire can't be much more than 3 to 4 feet above this depending upon how many wires there are, so I would summise that depending upon the surrounding area, on a plain unobstructed route with four layers of wire the poles would be no more than 20ft showing with 5ft below ground. This would then rise and fall as required by the conditions, such as at Quorn where the pole route visibly climbs to around 40ft in order to cross over the road which itself is crossing the railway - google earth Woodhouse road, Quorn, and go to street view, the BT pole on the road is a 10M and still doesn't match the standing height of the telegraph pole opposite it; I know, I've climbed it

[intraclast]

This has got me wondering, how wide should a telegraph pole be in  ?

Sometimes you see ones that are far too fat to be to scale.

[EtchedPixels]

A lot are too fat in order to be strong enough.

My favourite telegraph pole moment btw was after NTL was doing cable installation and got in trouble for damaging some tree roots. Faced with a bunch of people at a meeting saying "People should use BT, they don't kill trees" the NTL guy calmly got up and asked "What are telegraph poles made of"

I don't think the Ratio ones are too far out. They scale at about 8" diameter

[Zunnan]

My favourite telegraph pole moment btw was after NTL was doing cable installation and got in trouble for damaging some tree roots. Faced with a bunch of people at a meeting saying "People should use BT, they don't kill trees" the NTL guy calmly got up and asked "What are telegraph poles made of"

Aluminium or fibreglass if wood is objected to. Yes, they go to that trouble. Can't say I like working on artificial poles mind you...can't climb them so how do you get the dropwire up?!

I don't think the Ratio ones are too far out. They scale at about 8" diameter

Don't forget that they taper from bottom to top, but that can be pretty hard to replicate. The plastic of ready to plant stuff is never going to really be strong enough at scale sizes, so I'd think they're manufactured to be durable rather than correct. Brass rod, solder and colourful language is the alternative. A 20ft (40mm) pole I'd say 1.3mm to 1.6mm would be about right, and 1.6mm to 2.1mm wouldn't be far from accurate for poles in the 30ft (60mm) range. But they can be thicker, especially as the height increases.

[gorebridge2001]

Can't say I like working on artificial poles mind you...can't climb them so how do you get the dropwire up?

After all the very impressive info you gave on wooden poles, I'm surprised you don't how to run a span to a hollow pole. I can explain, but as this is a model railway forum I will only do so if specifically asked - particularly as this is my first post.   

By the way, has anyone modelled a hollow pole as part of their street scene?

[Zunnan]

That was a rhetorical question

I'd imagine a hollow pole would be quite easy to model, at least a fibreglass one would. A cut down flag pole would be perfect, just drill a hole in the tip and glue a few strands of black hair to represent dropwire 10, then add the bird stopper on top (if you can be bothered, we rarely do in real life, which is why I hate working on the things...when all that crap amongst other things falls down the inside onto you). The faceted aluminium hollow poles would be a challenge though, probably one that would best be left to a whitemetal casting, which would then also not need painting