page_title: Gyro monorail
section_title: Benign failure modes
hierarchical_section_title: Gyro monorail / Potential advantages over two-rail vehicles / Benign failure modes
caption_attribution_description: English: Illustration of single and two track toppling
context_page_description: The gyro monorail, gyroscopic monorail, gyro-stabilized monorail, or gyrocar are terms for a single rail land vehicle that uses the gyroscopic action of a spinning wheel to overcome the inherent instability of balancing on top of a single rail.
  The monorail is associated with the names Louis Brennan, August Scherl and Pyotr Shilovsky, who each built full-scale working prototypes during the early part of the twentieth century. A version was developed by Ernest F. Swinney, Harry Ferreira and Louis E. Swinney in the US in 1962.
  The gyro monorail was never developed beyond the prototype stage.
  The principal advantage of the monorail cited by Shilovsky is the suppression of hunting oscillation, a speed limitation encountered by conventional railways at the time. Also, sharper turns are possible compared to the 7 km radius of turn typical of modern high-speed trains such as the TGV, because the vehicle will bank automatically on bends, like an aircraft, so that no lateral centrifugal acceleration is experienced on board.
  A major drawback is that many cars – including passenger and freight cars, not just the locomotive – would require a constantly powered gyroscope to stay upright.
context_section_description: The angular momentum in the gyros is so high that loss of power will not present a hazard for a good half-hour in a well designed system.
caption: Monorail v two track response
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