Hi,

I was thinking about the history of technology and the railroad spike.

I think the earliest railroad spikes were made by blacksmiths. With ties spaced at 18", there ate about 3520 ties per mile of railroad. With 4 spikes per tie, that yields about 14,100 spikes per mile. (one million spikes would cover only about 71 miles of track).

I would think that automating the process of making spikes would have been quickly seen and experimented with.

I tried searching the web about forging railroad spikes and most of the hits are for knives and gardening implements made from spikes.

Anyone have an idea about the history of manufacturing the railroad spike?

Thanks.

Doug vV

Here's a patent from 1900 for a spike making machine.

http://www.google.com/patents/US685477

Tim

There was such a thing as automated volume production in industry even in the 18th century.

The Smithsonian has an automated sewing pin making machine that is very, very old. It is a rotating table that moves the pins between machining operations.

I would image that spikes were mass produced very early as well.

Back when iron rails were being made, the wrought iron was made in 500 lb. batches in puddling furnaces. Each batch took a little over an hour for two people to make, so puddling mills would have ten, twenty or more furnaces. So with the amount of labor required just to make the rails, having a building full of blacksmiths making spikes manually from muck bar isn't that much of a stretch.

Doug,

Henry Burden of the Burden Iron Works developed the machine for manufacturing railroad spikes at Troy, NY. This was probably in the 1840s. Just before the Civil War he developed a machine for making horse shoes. He got the contract to supply the Union Army and became very rich. See:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burden_Iron_Works

If you are ever in Troy stop by the Burden Iron Works Museum.

The Bethlehem Steel fastener plant in Lebanon, PA was hailed as the largest spike plant in the world.
I think it is still in operation as Keystone Spikes (part of Vossloh?)

I have one of their early catalogs pre-Bethlehem when it was independent.

Most of the large steelmakers had spike making operations. In an industry where success is measured by tonnage, making spikes was more of an annoyance, but did help in filling out the product line. Youngstown Sheet & Tube did not make rails, but did roll tie plates and produced spikes at their Struthers, OH works. Up the road in Youngstown Republic Steel did the same, but Republic also made a full line of various sizes from mine spikes on up.

Bethlehem had a full blown railroad products divisions and largely dominated the market for trackwork. Their model 50-A switch stand is in my opinion the best design ever sold.

I got a chance to visit the spike plant in Lebanon when it was owned by Pohl Corp. 20' pieces of square stock was fed into an electric oven and heated to red hot. Next a machine cut it to length and fed it automatically into a machine that simultaneously struck the head of the spike and formed the tip. The spike was then ejected into a bin to cool. When it was in full operation, there was a 2' gauge railroad system in the building for moving hot spikes around to cool. Really neat place. Wish I had taken pictures.

The best way in this day and age to avoid forged railroad spikes is to demand a Certificate of Authenticity, and inspect the hologram closely for its 3-D effect, before purchase.

[dives for cover]

Here in Southern California, Hollywood is getting all geared up for Oscar Night. In the spirit of the "awards season", Mr. Mitchell receives the Rolf St. Clair Augustine "Pun-American Prize" trophy for that one.

I dunno... I got some spikes off a website based in China that has the hologram and everything. The guy claimed they were factory seconds, but you know how that is. He also tried to sell me some Coaches as well.

The sad truth is that a lot of railroads out there are using the cheaply forged Chinese spikes nowadays and passing them off as legit. :)

I have seen spikes for sale from RRs I guess you could call them forged, probably. Over the years, I've seen people at collectible shows selling what are reputed to be spikes found along ROW of long-pulled up lines. I saw someone selling a 'found O&W' spike at a show in Maryland in the 90s and he wanted almost 100 bucks for it (and it was gone the second pass I made through the show, so he likely sold it).