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Pastimes : Don't Ask Rambi -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Gauguin who wrote (51510)	5/31/2000 7:20:00 PM
From: Crocodile	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 71178

The ties aren't hardwood, either, as I recall. Well, as it happens... Mr. R. C. Hosie... author of Native Trees of Canada has something to say about railroad ties as well as obnoxious little boys who crawl all over Manitoba Maples, or get into your PawPaw fruit... He says that Tamarack (Larch) is the tree of choice for railway ties... Let me just quote from his notes: WOOD: Moderately hard and heavy, somewhat oily; heartwood yellowish-brown, decay resistant, sapwood whitish, frequently spiral-grained. IMPORTANCE: Used for railway ties, poles, posts, piling, boxes, crates, boat building and pulpwood. NOTES: Tannin for use in tanning leather can be extracted from the bark. In the days of wooden ships, the ship-builders prized Tamarack roots for joining ribs to deck timbers... So there you go... massive strength, but probably shatter or crack-proof and a bit flexible... We have Tamarack growing here at the farm.. I planted some about 6 years ago. They grow quite quickly... They have needles that fall off in winter... Have the most beautiful soft green needles in spring... But in winter they really look like dead sticks... BTW, R.C. Hosie says that Douglas Fir is also a good railroad tie wood... No doubt it is probably in even greater use than Tamaracks which, I think, aren't that plentiful anymore. I think driving one with a sledge would be interesting. But that's probably for a real man. I would be pressed to hit it. It's not very easy. Supposedly you always drive the spike from across the other side of a rail... I read that somewhere recently. It's why the heads of the spikes are offset or something... I wouldn't mind trying to drive a spike... Have done a lot of smashing with sledgehammers in the past... probably good practice... BTW, there's a funny story behind this, but I'm too tired to type it out tonight... (-: We should see if we can find a Railroad Man. I'll think on that a little... I might know someone who knows this kind of stuff. My Dad definitely would have known because he used to travel up into Northern Quebec and Ontario with a lot of the railway crews on those little motorized things... we just call them Putt-Putts up here... hee hee...