Handbook of Railroad Construction; For the use of American engineers. / Containing the necessary rules, tables, and formulæ for the location, construction, equipment, and management of railroads, as built in the United States.

by George L. Vose

Upon the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad there have been used forty-five pound rails of reheated and refined iron, which have lasted for eighteen years; and that with a very heavy traffic upon them. While upon other American roads, English sixty pound rails have required renewing in one, two, three, and four years.

The durability of rails is practically independent of time, and depends entirely upon the amount of work done. The repairs of iron, depending upon flaws and other physical defects, will be greater at the commencement of operations than afterwards. After the first one or two years the regular depreciation begins. The first Liverpool and Manchester rail weighed thirty-five lbs. per yard, and the locomotive seven and a half tons. As the traffic increased, so did the necessary weight of engines, and a corresponding increase in the strength and weight of rails was also rendered necessary. In 1831, the average weight of engines with tenders was eighteen tons. In 1855, the maximum engine with tender, fuel, and water weighed sixty tons; and in like manner the rails increased from thirty-five to eighty-five lbs. per yard.

Messrs. Stephenson and Locke, in a report to the London and North-western Railroad Company, in 1849, recommend the adoption in future of an eighty-five lb. rail.

Upon the roads of Belgium are used rails of fifty-five and sixty-four lbs. per yard; but it is asserted that an eighty lb. rail would allow of ten times more traffic.

For the average of American roads, when the iron is good, (in quality,) fifty-five, sixty, and at most sixty-five lbs., will probably be found ample for the heaviest traffic: the rail being of the form already given, and supported on ties not more than two and a half feet from centre to centre.

Mr. Belpaire, (of the Belgium engineers,) concludes, from many experiments, that in sixty miles, each engine abrades 2.2 lbs.; each empty car 4½ oz.; and each ton of load 1.4 oz.; the amounts being in direct ratio to the several weights.

Captain Huish, of the London and North-western Railroad, (England,) estimates (Report of April, 1849) that fifty trains per day, or 18,250 trains per annum, for twenty years, would wear out a seventy lb. rail.

The Belgian engineers have concluded that 3,000 trains per annum, for one hundred and twenty years, would wear out a fifty-five lb. rail.

Now 120 × 3,000 = 360,000 Belgian, and 20 × 18,250 = 365,000 English, a very satisfactory coincidence, as the different observers did not know of each other’s proceedings. The difference, 5,000 trains, being accounted for by the use of heavier engines upon the roads of England.

From the above results the following table is formed, showing the life of rails under from two to one hundred trains per day. American roads being less nicely finished, as regards the road-bed, will of course wear out rails faster than the roads of Europe. The table will serve as a base for estimates.