cutting/breaking railroad track?

[DavidTodtman]

On 8/18/2018 at 1:22 PM, Icorps1970 said:

The “Gandy Dancers” used to break rail all the time back in the day.  Had a large chisel with a handle for the scoring. Breaks easier in cold weather.  My this from my Grandfather who worked for the Rock Island RR.  My father was a contractor who took up several hundred miles of track from the early 1960s till the late 70s. I saw many of these chisels.  They lacked the power tools snd mechanization of today well into 1960s and railroads far predate cutting torches. So the would break the rail if needed. 

I worked in the Columbia River Valley south of Golden, British Columbia on a four-person section gang in the early 1970s. We usually cut rail with a gas powered hack saw running at a slow speed. I cannot recall exactly how long the cut took but I would guess the time was about 20 minutes. While the machine ran, we got to sit, chew the fat with each other, and gaze up at the Rocky Mountain peaks

. Occasionally--when we were in a pinch and without our power hack saw, we cut with a scoring chisel (on long handle as noted in the post by Icorps1970). It worked to produce a relatively square and smooth cut. Smooth enough to make an adequate track joint.

 

[Jon Kerr]

Hi guys- sorry to ressurect a long dead topic.

Is it not possible to do this with a 4" angle grinder and cutting wheel? What happens when you try, does it just burn the wheel out and no cut?

Can you not cut the bottom flange (softer) with a grinder and then hit with a sledge to crack the hardened top section? Maybe also score with a chisel as described above?

[pnut]

It'll take a few wheels but you can definitely do it. If it's a long piece of rail you could probably score it with the disc and lift it at the score and it should break. 

Pnut

[Skelley]

Hello,      We cut rail on the Cumberland Rose Branch out of Creston, Iowa in 1973. it was against Federal law to use a cutting torch.  We had a gas - powered saw but never had it with us. We cut rail by cold chiseling(large sledge and large chisel with wood handle to side ) a line completely around the cut or chisel top of the ball and notch the web on both sides. Either the chisel holder or the sledger got shrapnel from the chisel (wear googles or safety glasses and be prepared to take some steel) . After the line was deeply chiseled take a rope soaked in diesel or kerosene and lay it on the chisel line. Ignite and let it heat the line . You do not have to heat the rail, but rail needs to be cool.  Rapidly cool with water or ice.  With the rail end elevated and/or with a spike or short piece of rail behind the intended break , give it a solid hit with sledge and it should break. Worked every time for us.  A 65 year old section foreman named Doc Hartman was our instructor. One of our chisel holders got a big chunk of steel in his arm. He showed the foreman.  The foreman comment was, Its not close to your heart. He was a good foreman, not any ones mother.  Shaun Kelley

[Frosty]

Welcome aboard Shaun, glad to have you. If you'll put your general location in the header you'll have a much better chance of hooking up with members living within visiting distance. 

I haven't heard that method of cutting rail. There used to be a site linked here with lots of methods, I was wishing I had some sort of useable filing system on my comp so I could post it again. I love hearing and seeing how pros do things.

Frosty The Lucky.

[George N. M.]

Does anyone have an idea of why it would be a bad thing to cut rail with a torch?  And serious enough that there was a federal regulation prohibiting it?  Some sort of HAZ which would make the rail brittle in the area of the cut?

GNM

[Steve Sells]

but that is exactly what heating and quenching with water does, makes that area brittle from the hardening

[Scott NC]

  George, this may give you somewhere to start digging as to the legality of it.  It's too much for me.  The fra and others have rules and it's a deep, deep administrative rabbit hole.  My guess is you are right.  It might have to do with welding in the field.  Thermite or whatever other process they have come up with by now.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/49/213.352

[ThomasPowers]

A rope  soaked in diesel or kerosene will not bring that much steel up to critical temp; maybe draw temper a bit.

[Scott NC]

  Then again, maybe that's what makes that crazy "clunk...clunk" sound you hear at the old gravel road crossings.  Take a good look at the rails flexing dangerously.  Chunks of HAZ cracked off.....

[Grahamn746]

Hi, i need to cut up some railway track in the UK.

I contacted a bandsaw blade supply company and they suggested a Bi metal blade with 4-6 tpi, does this sound right?

My bandsaw has a coolant/lube feed to the blade, and although the track is old it has been stored and never used.

Would appreciate some advice from someone with more experience in this kind of work.

 

Regards Graham

[Jason L]

The railroads around here use thermite to cut track. They clamp molds to the track and fill a hole in the top of the molds with thermite then light it. I used to watch them do it and try and score the cutoffs if they weren't too long. The building I worked in at the time was the old depot and so a lot of railroad items were left in it. I actually got a few pounds of thermite and there were a few boxes of the molds left in there as well. Interestingly enough I also found a box with some torpedoes in it but they had sweated pretty badly and I got someone else (a RR employee) to remove them as soon as possible. Once I got the box out and saw what was in it, I was too afraid to move it so it sat where I left it till they picked it up. It's terrifying what can be found in old depots. 

[Frosty]

That's a new one on me Jason, I've never heard of a track gang cutting rail with thermite. Welding it yes, cutting I've never heard of. I've been wrong before, show me please, I'm used to admitting when I'm wrong.

Anymore the RR around here and on many online videos or track work crews use dry saws or break it the old way.

If you use a band saw place the rail in the clamp flange UP and slanted towards the direction the blade cuts so the teeth cut the rail cap from underneath. RR rail is only induction hardened on the wheel contact surface to reduce friction and wear. Cut it from underneath and the hardened surface chips without actually being touched by a tooth. 

The way the RR track gangs cut rail until recently was to score it with a chisel on the mark and drop it on another piece of rail or even a tie under the incised cut line. You can do the same thing with a sledge hammer if the piece you're cutting is under a couple feet long. 

That's how I do it, it's getting too hard to find bandsaw blades that without crazy fine TPI, I haven't seen 3-4 tpi blades in years. So I score it with a chisel and smack it with a sledge. EZ PZ.

Frosty The Lucky.

[JHCC]

The only results I could find online for thermite cutting were either very old, wouldn't pass the "no political content" filter, or confuse thermite with a thermic lance (burning bar*). I supposed a thermite burn that was designed to have the molten metal flow out of the cut rather than solidifying inside it *could* cut a rail, but a quick Googling doesn't show any examples of anyone actually doing that.

 

*If anyone is interested, there are a number of articles about mad scientist Theodore Gray (maker of the periodic table table) fabricating a thermic lance that instead of using iron as the fuel uses bacon.

[Jason L]

Hey Frosty, the molds and thermite I found in our warehouse may have been used for welding, the RR sold the building to a friend of mine for $1 back in the 70's I think. Why can't I find deals like that? I've watched them several times and come to think of it, I don't actually know what they are doing to the track. They usually cut out a small section, maybe a couple inches or so, then weld it back together. They told me why they do it but I can't remember what they said. From what I could tell they clamp a big mold to the track, pour a bag of thermite in the top of the mold, put a magnesium strip in it like a fuse and light it. When it's done I guess they break the mold off then a special rail car comes along with grinders to smooth it all out. I usually didn't stick around for the whole thing. I would just run out and ask them to leave the cutoffs and go back in to work till they were gone and go collect my prize later in the day, if they left it. Usually they would toss it over the chain link fence for me but often enough they would take it with them. I'd collect my prize later in the day after they left. 

[Frosty]

The rail gangs discourage folks watching close enough to see what they're doing. They cut an inch or two gap so the thermite can make a proper weld. 

See if this brings back memories. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfZSYFOtHyA&ab_channel=ccrx6700That'sRailroadin!

How many molds do you still have, thermite? Could be some performance art sculpture material there. It'd fit right in at Burning Man, some of those folk fire off 55gl. drums of thermite for funsies.

Frosty The Lucky.

 

[Jason L]

I've got about a pound of the thermite but I don't have any of the molds. They're still at the store but I don't have access anymore. They are much smaller than the ones they use now. Made out of something that looks like porous terra cotta. Quite brittle and thin but they fit modern track just fine. I'm thinking they were from the 70's, maybe as early as the 50's or 60's but I have no way of knowing for sure

[BeaverNZ]

I have just cut the rail head across with the oxy and gone to have smoko and when I returned it had just fractured the rest of the way through, It is 1085 steel generally unless its from a low service line where somwtimes they would cheap out and use a lower grade. The really old stuff can be wrought iron but that would be over 100 year old rail. I have done alot of thermite welding of rail but it was on 80Kg/meter crane rail track, Its an impresive process and really makes an increadable amount of heat in a few seconds. As to the cutting using thermite the guy who taught us how to do it told us a story about how a guy had caught out his wife with her specail friend and had set off a thermite charge on the bonnet of his car and it went through the engine block

[Jason L]

Most of the stuff I have is of recent vintage. Most of it cut out within the last 5 years or so. The tracks were right next to our building, within 30' or so and there is a maintenance shack right outside our back gate so I never was left wanting for railroad iron although it suck having freight trains rumble by every few minutes for 10 hours a day and with two sets of tracks sometimes they would double up. I always wanted to climb the coal cars with a shovel and fill up my truck but I never did anything like that. They stayed parked next to our building sometimes for days on end.

[Frosty]

Good thing you didn't taking a little coal is a federal offense and the RR WILL get really sticky about it.

Frosty The Lucky.

[Jason L]

Yeah, I don't like taking things that aren't mine, but it sure was tempting lol

[Frosty]

Yeah, it's a world of temptation. Happily the older I get the easier it is to resist.

Frosty The Lucky.