REVIEWS 73 



valuable comments of interest to foresters, and which should not be 

 left buried in the official proceedings. 



To secure the best results, ties should be cut when the bark is tight, 

 thereby lessening the danger of incipient decay before and during sea- 

 soning. Experience has shown that a great many failures of treated 

 ties are due to decayed condition before treatment. The careful and 

 thorough seasoning of ties in the yard of the plant is highly important. 

 The kind of treatment employed should be standard and the best that 

 experience dictates. Poor work, particularly skimping to cheapen the 

 process, means sure los-, and dissatisfaction later. 



Effective treatment should not stop at the plant, but should extend to 

 the maintenance in track. Heavy tie plates are essential, especially 

 with light rails and the softer woods. The heavier the rail the less the 

 mechanical injury to the tie. Enough anti-creepers should be used to 

 hold the rails in place, the creeping of rails being most serious of 

 course in tracks with one-way traffic only. The road should be well 

 ballasted and well drained. 



Test tracks are recommended and suggestions, based on years of 

 experience, are given for the care and inspection of such tracks and 

 the keeping of the records. Not less than 100 ties of a kind should 

 ever be used for a test, and they should be laid "out of face" or all of a 

 kind together. The Burlington has 26,000 test ties marked with nails 

 and paint and the rules forbid anybody touching a tie except in case of 

 wreck or accident, unless it has been previously marked by the proper 

 authority. The division superintendent is held responsible for the test 

 tracks in his division. 



Experience on this railroad has shown that the best treatment for 

 ties is straight creosote; second best, Card process (creosote and zinc 

 chloride) ; third, Burnettizing (zinc chloride). 



-As to choice of species giving the best results when treated, red oak 

 is ranked first. Over 60 per cent of the red oak ties treated with 

 zinc chloride are still in track in the Black Hills after 18 years' service. 



Douglas fir ranks second. The average life untreated is six years. 

 In a mile of treated fir track, 75 per cent have been in 18 years. Tie 

 plates are necessary with fir ties. "I have seen ties on our railroad, fir 

 ties, that were cut half in two in six years when the track right at the 

 side of it with the same kind of tie, the same treatment except tie- 

 plated, was in 16 years." 



Cypress, sap not heart, is ranked third. Loblolly pine is satisfactory, 

 but is likely to be rotten before treatment. Mountain pine (lodgepole) 

 has proved serviceable and several miles of track laid with this species 

 havcL been in 18 years. 



