The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1873-02-15
The Life of Rails.

1t is hardly safe now to regard any estimate of
iron rails Not that iron rails cannot be made
that will show good wearing results, but from
the fact that with very few exceptions none are
made. On the Boston and Albany railroad some
H. 900 tons of iron rails were laid last year, and
of this amount 800 tons have been removed from
the track as useless or unsafe. The managers of
this road, in common with most others having
roads of large traffic, have resolved to adopt the
use of steel rails hereafter and we learn that they
have bought some 5000 tons of steel rails in
Europe, 1000 tons of which win arrive and be
put upon the track this season, and the balance
during the next Summer.
The duration of life of rails depends upon the
quality of the iron of which they are made, and
upon the amount and speed of the traffic passing
over them. The rails first made in England were
rolled from No. cold blast iron, run out in
inery fire, puddled, shingled, rolled into bars,
and were cut, piled, heated, and hammered into
blooms, and these were re-heated and rolled into
rails The result was a material such as is rarely
seen upon our railways at the present time. The
old forty-fve pounds Reading rail bore an i'm
mense trafice for twenty years, and like char
acter of rail on the Boston and Providence road
lasted some thirty years; and many of these rails
are now in use on the road, though not In eX-
posed positions. The iron at first used upon
English roads in many cases withstood from 10
to 20 years of wear under an enormous trattc.-
1t was estimated in 1910, upon the London and
Northwestern railway, that so trains day for
twenty years, or 3l3 900 trains, would wear out
a 7O.pouuds rail- With the material now put
into railway tracks, however, no such service is
obtained Under favorable conditions, good iron
will last eight years under an average traffic =
but with the material commonly employed, from
three to six years is all that be counted on for
roads doing good amount OF work and the
life of the iron upon the great routes Is IN many
cases less than this.
With regard to the life of steel rails, every
thing here again depends upon the quaiity OF tue
metal. pair of 2l feet Bessemer steel rails, up
on the London and Northwestern railway, cut
lasted sixteen faces Of iron rail, being evenly
worn TO depth of little over quarter OF an
inch having in about three years sustained the
traffic of upward of 5000, 900 engines and cars,
or about 95, ,0O0, 900 tons. This particular pair
of rails were finally destroyed by locomotive
running off the track the wheels striking the
rail traversely and badly bending and breaking
them. 1t is estimated that they would have en-
dured at least one-half as much more tonnage
but for the accident. &c. too upon The Phlla-
delphia Wilmington and Baltimore railway
good steel rail has outlasted sixeeniron rails the
use of both being the same and on many other
roads OF large traffic the same successful results
have been achieved. Railway managers have to
exercise more care and discrimination IN the
quality of the rails they purchase, wht her made
of iron or STEEL In fact there is good amount
OF pretty miserable stuff sold for steel rails, as
some of the managers of the New England roads
know TO their cost-Loaaon Rdii'cay Times.