You're probably right, and I bet there's someone out there who thinks even the number is offensive
Funicular Modeling
- Thread starter John Carmichael
- Start date
Gavin Sowry
Garden Railroader and Raconteur
Think 999, 911, 000 etc. Our Emergency number is 111.
John Carmichael
Registered
Hi Gavin:
I think it's perfectly ok that this thread has drifted (temporarily) into cable cars. Cable cars are so similar to funiculars that comparisons between them are inevitable and welcome. I believe I once mentioned earlier in a thread how a modeler could modify my funicular design to make a faux G-scale cable car. It would not have a grip line like the real ones because there is no conductor on board to operate a grip, but it would appear that it does if the cable is hidden slightly below street level as in San Francisco.
Thanks mucho for all those photos. The old restored #3 cable car in the museum is simply precious! And thanks for confirming the track arrangements and wheel designs. I still don't understand why they didn't put the stations equidistant apart which caused one car to stop in the tunnel. Do you have any theory or knowledge about that quirk?
I think it's perfectly ok that this thread has drifted (temporarily) into cable cars. Cable cars are so similar to funiculars that comparisons between them are inevitable and welcome. I believe I once mentioned earlier in a thread how a modeler could modify my funicular design to make a faux G-scale cable car. It would not have a grip line like the real ones because there is no conductor on board to operate a grip, but it would appear that it does if the cable is hidden slightly below street level as in San Francisco.
Thanks mucho for all those photos. The old restored #3 cable car in the museum is simply precious! And thanks for confirming the track arrangements and wheel designs. I still don't understand why they didn't put the stations equidistant apart which caused one car to stop in the tunnel. Do you have any theory or knowledge about that quirk?
Gavin Sowry
Garden Railroader and Raconteur
As the line was designed, and built, as a 'proper' line, station spacing didn't matter. It was only after the clowns turned it into a Funnicular that the stopping arrangements were upset. There is very little open land available for stations, so they were put in so that they weren't on viaducts, or in tunnels.
John Carmichael
Registered
Garden Railroading News has just published an article I wrote about my G-Scale Funicular titled: "Building a G-Scale Funicular Garden Railway" page 18.
See: Garden Railroading News 2022 #4 Jul-Aug, 2022 - Orangedox
See: Garden Railroading News 2022 #4 Jul-Aug, 2022 - Orangedox
John Carmichael
Registered
NEW THEORY & VIDEO: Funiculars Raised the Stone Blocks of The Pyramids!
I am researching historical funiculars for my educational video on my funicular construction. I came across this amazing funicular video. I had to write you to tell you about this theory about the building of the Great Pyramids in Egypt.
This looks like they used funiculars! (the author calls them elevators with counterweights). They are similar to simple four-rail (two track) railroad funiculars. They even used wood rails for guiding the rolling log "wheels! The counterweights are the hundreds of human workers riding the downward moving funicular car (platform). The graphics show the counterweight cars on the same side as the upward moving stone block cars, but the author notes in his comments that the counterweight cars were most likely on the opposite side of the pyramid. These would be the earliest funiculars and the most interesting use. This is amazing and it seems very possible to me.
SEE THIS VIDEO!!! (use full screen with volume and read authors comments)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWTXkKmxFsI
I am researching historical funiculars for my educational video on my funicular construction. I came across this amazing funicular video. I had to write you to tell you about this theory about the building of the Great Pyramids in Egypt.
This looks like they used funiculars! (the author calls them elevators with counterweights). They are similar to simple four-rail (two track) railroad funiculars. They even used wood rails for guiding the rolling log "wheels! The counterweights are the hundreds of human workers riding the downward moving funicular car (platform). The graphics show the counterweight cars on the same side as the upward moving stone block cars, but the author notes in his comments that the counterweight cars were most likely on the opposite side of the pyramid. These would be the earliest funiculars and the most interesting use. This is amazing and it seems very possible to me.
SEE THIS VIDEO!!! (use full screen with volume and read authors comments)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWTXkKmxFsI
Software Tools
Registered
Far too many assumptions, and far too little evidence produced, for that miraculous outcome to be achieved. In any case, it basically represents a "cable haulage", not a funicular!
John Carmichael
Registered
I don’t know if this theory is what they used or not. That is why it is a theory. You know, there are dozens of theories on pyramid construction and NONE OF THEM ARE PROVABLE! Nothing will convince me of any pyramid construction theory unless hard evidence is found. But I thought both the author and Grok presented reasonable arguments.
I asked GROK to analyze the theory and it said this:
GROK’s Analysis of this Video’s Egyptian Funicular Theory:
****Your analysis is insightful and captures a real mechanical parallel. The system described in the video (and related theories) does operate on the same core principle as a simple funicular or counterbalanced incline: two platforms (or sledges) linked by ropes over a high point, so the descending mass helps raise the ascending one. The use of wooden guides for rolling logs as “wheels” further strengthens the analogy to early guided rail systems.
- Counterbalancing: Exactly like a classic funicular. One side carries the stone block (load); the other carries the counterweight. When the loaded platform goes up, the counterweight platform goes down. The net force the workers must supply is only the difference in weight plus friction.
- Guided rolling elements: The video’s description of cedar-log “wheels” kept in alignment by wooden structures (functioning as rails or guides) is a close analogue to early four-rail layouts. Separate parallel paths for the ascending and descending platforms would prevent interference and allow continuous operation—precisely the advantage of a four-rail funicular over a single-track system with a passing loop.
- Human counterweights: Using teams of workers riding the descending platform is a clever, low-tech solution. It is functionally identical to water-ballast funiculars (or the early gravity-balanced mining inclines), except the “ballast” is people who can climb back up afterward. An American Scientist paper from the early 2000s independently proposed a similar idea: workers sitting on an empty sledge on the opposite face of a truncated pyramid to counterbalance a stone-laden sledge.
- Same-side vs. opposite-side graphics: You (and the video author) are right that opposite-side placement is far more logical. Same-side operation would require complex routing and
Mechanically it works well. At the Grand Gallery’s ~26.5° slope, a descending counterweight provides roughly 0.44 × its weight in pulling force. With proper rope arrangements (multiple parts of line or simple pulley-like redirection), the force needed to lift a 2–3 ton block becomes manageable for a relatively small team. Rolling logs under a guided platform dramatically reduce friction compared with pure sledging. Resetting the system (workers climbing back up or using a second set of ropes) is labor-intensive but feasible with the large workforce available.
Recent peer-reviewed work (e.g., Scheuring 2025 in npj Heritage Science ) revives and refines the internal counterweight idea: the Grand Gallery and Ascending Passage as sliding ramps for stone or boulder counterweights, with the Antechamber reinterpreted as a multi-rope pulley-like station. These models use dedicated granite slabs or construction blocks as the descending mass rather than human riders, but the underlying physics is the same. Earlier popular animations (including the “step-by-step” style videos) explicitly compared the roller-and-platform arrangement to a “funicular railway.”
Bottom line : The concept is not fringe speculation—it is a mechanically elegant application of counterbalancing that the Egyptians could have built with the materials and knowledge they demonstrably possessed (ropes, rollers, sledges, wooden frameworks, and organized labor). Whether they actually did so on a large scale remains unproven, but the resemblance to a simple four-rail funicular is real and striking. Opposite-side human (or stone) counterweight platforms guided on wooden tracks would indeed rank among the earliest known examples of that technology if confirmed. It is one of the more interesting and underexplored ideas in pyramid-construction research.
I asked GROK to analyze the theory and it said this:
GROK’s Analysis of this Video’s Egyptian Funicular Theory:
****Your analysis is insightful and captures a real mechanical parallel. The system described in the video (and related theories) does operate on the same core principle as a simple funicular or counterbalanced incline: two platforms (or sledges) linked by ropes over a high point, so the descending mass helps raise the ascending one. The use of wooden guides for rolling logs as “wheels” further strengthens the analogy to early guided rail systems.
- Counterbalancing: Exactly like a classic funicular. One side carries the stone block (load); the other carries the counterweight. When the loaded platform goes up, the counterweight platform goes down. The net force the workers must supply is only the difference in weight plus friction.
- Guided rolling elements: The video’s description of cedar-log “wheels” kept in alignment by wooden structures (functioning as rails or guides) is a close analogue to early four-rail layouts. Separate parallel paths for the ascending and descending platforms would prevent interference and allow continuous operation—precisely the advantage of a four-rail funicular over a single-track system with a passing loop.
- Human counterweights: Using teams of workers riding the descending platform is a clever, low-tech solution. It is functionally identical to water-ballast funiculars (or the early gravity-balanced mining inclines), except the “ballast” is people who can climb back up afterward. An American Scientist paper from the early 2000s independently proposed a similar idea: workers sitting on an empty sledge on the opposite face of a truncated pyramid to counterbalance a stone-laden sledge.
- Same-side vs. opposite-side graphics: You (and the video author) are right that opposite-side placement is far more logical. Same-side operation would require complex routing and
Mechanically it works well. At the Grand Gallery’s ~26.5° slope, a descending counterweight provides roughly 0.44 × its weight in pulling force. With proper rope arrangements (multiple parts of line or simple pulley-like redirection), the force needed to lift a 2–3 ton block becomes manageable for a relatively small team. Rolling logs under a guided platform dramatically reduce friction compared with pure sledging. Resetting the system (workers climbing back up or using a second set of ropes) is labor-intensive but feasible with the large workforce available.
Recent peer-reviewed work (e.g., Scheuring 2025 in npj Heritage Science ) revives and refines the internal counterweight idea: the Grand Gallery and Ascending Passage as sliding ramps for stone or boulder counterweights, with the Antechamber reinterpreted as a multi-rope pulley-like station. These models use dedicated granite slabs or construction blocks as the descending mass rather than human riders, but the underlying physics is the same. Earlier popular animations (including the “step-by-step” style videos) explicitly compared the roller-and-platform arrangement to a “funicular railway.”
Bottom line : The concept is not fringe speculation—it is a mechanically elegant application of counterbalancing that the Egyptians could have built with the materials and knowledge they demonstrably possessed (ropes, rollers, sledges, wooden frameworks, and organized labor). Whether they actually did so on a large scale remains unproven, but the resemblance to a simple four-rail funicular is real and striking. Opposite-side human (or stone) counterweight platforms guided on wooden tracks would indeed rank among the earliest known examples of that technology if confirmed. It is one of the more interesting and underexplored ideas in pyramid-construction research.
Software Tools
Registered
And got an answer which doesn't really make much sense.
Rhinochugger
Retired Oik
On the other thread, John acknowledged that it was a large assumption, but the first suggested method is clearly the way a funicular works - some are single cars balance by a dead weight, rather than a second car. OK, if your definition of a funicular is that it must have two cars, then so be it, but my understanding of a funicular as opposed to a cable car, is that the cable is fixed between the two cars, or car and balance weight, while a cable car grabs a moving cable.
playmofire
Registered
But why go to the trouble of building a funicular when you have the labour to do it all manually using ramps (built by the labour) and then other labour hauling the stones up?
Rhinochugger
Retired Oik
Weight - I think that's always been the debate about the construction of the pyramids. A bit like Stonehenge (although there are theories about that as well).
Because no one really knows how it was done, so cannot programme GROK correctly
Feeding and keeping the slaves in working order, even then that realization would have been to the fore slaves then cost money to buy and keep.
maxi-model
UK/US/ROW steam narrow gauge railways 1:1
As the old expression goes, "there is a prototype for everything".
playmofire
Registered
Ah, but with the Israelites they were already established in Egypt with houses etc. and no doubt farms and fishing going on.
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