mudchicken: This isn’t the first time I’ve learned something from your responses to my questions. Thank you. Not only did you answer my question, you explained the answer so it makes sense to me.
Torch cut anything is an invitation to a broken rail or a “dutchman” inside the limits of the anglebar (the ball of rail just lifts-out behid the angle bar and rattles around (broken) between the bars if left in place)
Eric: Paul has whole new set of weird-isms over here to deal with.
Ditto for me, MC. I think I read about torch cutting being done in the long-ago hazy past, and the concept stayed lodged in my brain for some strange reason. It was the only other way I could think of to make holes in the rail out in the field.
An update: The work looks to be complete on the W&LE section bordering the park. First, they welded the west rail; now I notice the east rail has been given the same treatment. The 39’ rails (with their holes) are lying next to the track, while new (and undrilled) 39’ rails have been welded together. The clickety-clack is gone. No doubt, the old rails will be gone in a week or two. Large piles of new ties are awaiting installation at other points on W&LE subsidiary Akron Barberton Cluster (ABC) Railroad (former Erie RR track).
It’s refreshing as well as interesting to see these railroads investing in upgrading their lines after so many years of deferred maintenance.
I remember discussions about ‘flame cut’ holes in riveted plate construction, including boiler construction, in which the necessary ‘final step’ was reaming to beyond the likely HAZ. Reaming is or used to be a much less difficult and energy-intensive procedure than full or holesaw drilling of an equivalent hole. But it does require more specialized and expensive tools.
With the advent of cheap industrial diamonds, it occurs to me that even with iron carbide formation, the use of a hole saw in circulating slurry containing fine diamond abrasive might be an attractive technology for rail drilling.
Some of this has been under investigation at Pueblo in a closed environment for over a decade. With the advent of MxV rail and two facilities in play, I’m not sure what’s currently going -on and what the metallurgists are seeing.
Hey NKP Guy,
Can you get close enough to see when the new rail was rolled? Does it look new (with gray mill scale) or is it on the dirty/rusty side? Are the rail lengths a full 39’ or are they shorter?
I am curious about whether actual newly rolled rail is being installed or if it’s secondhand stuff. We had a lot of 31’ (cropped from 33’ rails), and 37’ rails (cropped from 39’) on the Chicago and North Western; old, old stuff that has probably been replaced by now.
You will now see a lot of 39’ rail placed on industry tracks (or short lines) that is made by cutting CWR (salvaged from main line use) into 39’ lengths, and drilling two holes on each end for joint bars (even for 6-hole bars). Although it seems a waste of CWR there are good reasons for the practice. First, 39’ lengths can be transported by truck; all track material for industry tracks is delivered by truck, not rail. Also, most track contractors are small-time outfits that don’t have a rail train to transport CWR (and none of today’s large railroads would ever handle someone elses rail train besides!).
With the portable electric flash-butt welders available today making CWR in the field is not a bad way to go. The welds can be the same quality as a factory weld, and it avoids setting up a welding plant and tranporting the CWR. For a smaller relay project the costs probably are comparable.
Kurt Hayek
sandiego: I’ll take a good look in the next few days and let you know. However, from appearances, the rail looks like new stuff based on what you wrote about its color.
sandiego: I put my face close to the rail and took a few photos. Here’s what’s on this newly-installed welded rail segment. Reading from left to right, it looks like it says, “1025 R E OH CARNEGIE USA 1989 llllllllll”
All the rail I could examine had the same lettering. I’ll have to leave what it all means to someone here with the needed Rosetta Stone.
As to the length of each pre-welded rail, I have no way of measuring that, but it looks like 39’, more or less.
Deciphering the code:
10025—100 lb./yard, RE section, the 25 is the steel company’s designation of an RE rail section. NOTE: There was a digit missing in the description so I guessed and added another zero as being most likely.
RE-the rail cross section; short for AREA (American Railway Engineering Association)
OH—steel made by open hearth process
Carnegie—Steel mill
USA-Country of origin
1989—Year rolled
IIIIIIIIII—Month rolled; if I counted correctly there are 10 lines, so 10th month (October)
So, used rail from somewhere, or being that it looks new, purchased for some project and never used. By 1989 very little 10025 rail was rolled, by any mill, and not for use by Class One railroads. Light rail use would be likely, and it would receive little wear, except possibly in a curve.
Kurt Hayek
Ain’t new rail and I think you need to look at rascal again…the raised letter branding repeats itself every 6 feet going down the rail…
CARNEGIE quit rolling rail a long time ago (Became US Steel (USS) back about 1902)
OH = Open Hearth (that practice quit a long time ago…1939?)
Sure that isn’t 1889 (Oct)?
1025 is not a common number(Never heard of 102 Lb Rail)
I took three photos with my phone, so I have enlarged and studied them for a considerable time today and I am as mystified as ever. The lettering is clearly as I described it. Like you gentlemen, I can’t quite believe my eyes. I’m familiar with Carnegie Steel and I know the name was dropped about 1902. But there it is in capital letters (CARNEGIE U S A). Unmistakeable. The 1989 is clear as a bell, too. It’s not 1939 or anything else. The 9’s are identical and the 8 is clear. There are indeed 10 vertical marks (October).
I looked at Google to see if there’s a Carnegie Works or Plant from about that time, but no. None of this makes sense to me, either.
I’d be glad to post these photos if I knew how, but you’d see just what I’m telling you.
Didn’t US Steel have one of the mills known as ‘The Carnegie Works’?
While I did live in Pittsburgh as a kid, I didn’t memorize the names of all the steel mills that were operative in the early 1950’s.
Some more information:
Although Illinois Steel, Carnegie Steel, and Tennessee Coal Iron & Railroad may have been merged into U. S. Steel that doesn’t mean the identification (“brand” is the correct term) changed. I know from field checks that “Illinois” and “Tennessee” (and I assume “Carnegie” also) were used for many years afterwards.
For example, on a rail rolled in 1949: 11525 RE CC ILLINOIS 1949 (115 lb., AREA section, controlled cooled, USS Gary works, 1949, month not recorded)
By 1953 there was a slight change: 11525 RE CC USS ILLINOIS 1953 (finally added the manufacturer’s initials)
Still same format in 1981: 11525 RE CC USS ILLINOIS 1981
I don’t recall running across rail marked “Carnegie” but I grew up in Minneapolis, worked for the UP, CNW, and BN, and traveled and railfanned the midwestern and western US so I mostly saw rail rolled in the midwest and west.
Where was “Carnegie” rail rolled? A possible answer: I remember reading once that Andrew Carnegie was trying to get the PRR to buy rail from Carnegie. In talks with the president of the Pennsy he mentioned he was naming the large new steel mill he was building “The Edger Thompson Works” (guess who was PRR’s president)?
It’s also possible that the rolls used to make the rail under discussion had not been used in some time and only had minimal changes made on the brand lettering to save money.
The 10025 rail is a good section but never became very popular; when introduced railroads were starting to use heavier rail sections, and railroads still using 100 lb. rail preferred standardizing on the earlier-design 100 lb. sections that they had been using. For example, I ran across some 10020 (aka 100RA; American Railway Association design) rail on Kyle Railroad around Goodland, Kans. This rail
Gary works didn’t exist when Illinois Steel existed, did it? (FWIW it’s in Indiana.) Did South Chicago roll rail?
So it does say 1025, not 10025? And it does say Carnegie, and it does say 1989?
Then no one can explain it.
Yes, yes, and yes.
I agree. Unexplainable.
Here are some actual “Illinois” rail branding examples:
7009 ILLINOIS STEEL CO. SOUTH WORKS 1899 (70 lb., unknown section)
9002 ILLINOIS STEEL CO. SOUTH WORKS 1904 (old no. for 90 lb. American Society of Civil Engineers (ACSE) section)
8506 ILLINOIS STEEL CO. SOUTH WORKS 1908 (old no. for 85 lb. CB&Q section)
10030 ILLINOIS STEEL CO. SOUTH WORKS 1909 (100 lb. American Railway Association type B section; there was also an ARA-A section)
9030 ILLINOIS STEEL CO. SOUTH WORKS 1912 (90 lb. ARA-B section)
Here is the change from South Works to Gary; sometime in 1912 or 1913.
9035 I. S. CO. GARY 1913 (90 lb. CNW section)
9010 I. S. CO. GARY 1914 I (old no. for 90 lb. Great Northern section; rolled January 1914; new number for this section was 9034)
8520 I. S. CO. GARY 1914 IIIIIII (85 lb. Soo Line section; rolled July 1914)
8520 ILLINOIS G 1914 IIII (85 lb. Soo Line section; rolled April 1914)
Note old brand still used after introduction of new brand—on same rail section no less; perhaps had two sets of rolls.
In 1914 many of the rail section numbers were changed, but many others continued using same numbers; most changes were in the ASCE sections, and many of the railroad-designed sections.
Kurt Hayek
Dep’t of Corrections:
I’m glad mudchicken mentioned the rail stampings are every six feet, because I looked at a number of them this morning while in the park (I must have looked like a terrorist or crazy person to the few other people I saw there, what with my face practically next to the rail).
It turns out it does say 11025 R E O H CARNEGIE USA 1939.
So I was wrong about the number and date. But if Carnegie went out of business in 1902, is this newly-installed and welded-together rail really over 120 years old? That seems preposterous.