Why do the British use 00 gauge instead of H0?

In Britain we love our 00 gauge model railways. It is the most popular gauge to model in closely followed by N gauge, and it would appear that around the world our modelling friends too prefer this gauge, it's just that they call it H0 gauge, which is fair enough.

Except that H0 gauge is actually a slightly different scale, so maybe we are not all united after all, but why have we chosen a different scale to the rest of the world?

Don't be too hard on us British though, it's not the modeller's fault (or choice for that matter). It is all to do with the loading gauge (a train's height and width) of real-life railways.

When the model railway industry wanted to produce a brand new gauge just after WW1 to appeal to everyday families it was decided to produce models roughly half the size of the already established 0 gauge.

The new gauge was to be called H0 (for "Half 0") and featured track with a gauge of 16.5mm between the rails to represent real-life standard gauge track. The trains that were to run on these tracks would have a scale of 1:87 (3.5mm to 1 foot) and production began.

The problem came when they tried to replicate British locomotives as they have a smaller loading gauge than most engines around the world. Try as they might the manufacturers could not squeeze early clockwork and electric mechanisms into the smaller body shells. After a lot of head-scratching the decision was made to increase the scale of British models to 1:76.2 (4mm to 1 foot) but for economic reasons keep the original track gauge. Despite the anomaly this was accepted by consumers as they were just delighted to now have a model railway available to them which was both affordable and a sensible size thus 00 gauge was born.

As time has passed and technology has evolved, it has become perfectly possible to create a mechanism to fit in a 1:87 scale body shell of a British locomotive. But no manufacturer would take the risk of changing the scale of their mainstream products because we tend to acquire our models over time operating old and new together. Due to H0 and 00 gauge rolling stock not sitting well together, it was felt that a loss of custom would be inevitable if such a move were to take place so the production of 00 gauge has continued to present day.

For modellers who desire ultimate realism, there are more accurate representations of track and rolling stock available but for most the compromise is acceptable and 00 gauge remains to this day the nation's favourite.