page_title: Break of gauge
section_title: Disadvantages
hierarchical_section_title: Break of gauge / Advantages and disadvantages / Disadvantages
caption_attribution_description: English: Bogie-changing operation in Ussurisk (or, more likely, in Grodekovo), near Vladivostok, at the border with China.
context_page_description: With railways, a break of gauge occurs where a line of one gauge meets a line of a different gauge: specifically a different track gauge. Trains and rolling stock cannot run through without some form of conversion between gauges, and freight and passengers must otherwise be transshipped. A break of gauge adds delays, cost, and inconvenience.
context_section_description: Transshipping freight from cars of one gauge to cars of another is very labour- and time-intensive, and increases the risk of damage to goods. If the capacity of the freight cars on both systems does not match, additional inefficiencies can arise. If the frequency is low, a train might need to wait a long time for its counterpart to arrive before transshipping. This might be avoided by storing the goods, but that is also costly and inconvenient.
  Technical solutions to avoid transshipping include variable gauge axles, replacing the bogies of cars, and using transporter cars that can carry a car of a different gauge.
  The Spanish manufacturers Talgo and CAF have developed dual-gauge axles (variable gauge axles) which permit through running between broad-gauge and standard-gauge lines. In Japan the Gauge Change Train, built on Talgo patents, runs on both standard and narrow 1,067 mm (3 ft 6 in) gauge.
  Breaks-of-gauge might also be avoided by installing dual-gauge track, either permanently or as part of a project to replace one gauge with another.
  At most breaks-of-gauge passengers have to change trains, but there are a few trains that run through, for example, the Talgo (variable-gauge axles, see above), and trains from Russia to China or Russia to Europe (bogie exchange), although on the latter two the passengers usually have to leave the train for some time whilst the accommodation work is done.
caption: Exchanging bogies at Ussuriysk (near Vladivostok) on the Chinese–Russian border
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