TRANSPORTATION ON LAND BY VEHICLES:— THE ROADS 



55 



Within the last 20 years, the use of steel railroads has increased enormously in the forests of the 

 United States. 



Lumbering in heavy stumpage on a large scale is considered impossible, practically speaking, without 

 railroads. 



Railroading requires, on the other hand, a large and heavy traffic of loads. It results, as a consequence, 

 in large, coherent clearings. 



Locomotive sparks are often responsible for the fires destructive of a second growth. 



(a) Portable track. In American lumbering "portable railroads" are little used. The sections of which 

 portable railroads consist are necessarily light and, consequently, unfit for the heavy, huge primeval logs. 

 They have a place, however, where the forests are second growth, or else in the lumber yard and the 

 wood yard. The sections are usually 6V2 feet long, have 2'/.., feet gauge and weigh 80 pounds. Steel ties 

 are preferred at the ends, so that the joints are supported by ties. The sections are joined by a hook 

 arrangement without being bolted together. 



Billmore Forest students inspecting- a portable forest railroad; notice the minute trucks, and the 

 small six horse -power gasoline motor. Darmstadt, Germany. 



Usually the sections are merely laid on the dirt. Motive power is supplied by gravity, men, or horses. 

 Wheel flanges are, frequently, on both sides of the rail. Rail sections of trapeze form are sometimes used 

 in building curves. Bridge switches are preferable to split switches. 



In the wood yard at Biltniore sections of wooden rails were used, the ties being replaced by iron 

 rods. The top of the rail was shod with a strip of ',4- inch iron, the ends joined by hook and pin, and 

 by hole and pin. Steel sectional tracks are manufactured, amongst others, by the C. W. Hunt Co., New York. 

 The trucks used have the wheel flange outside. Curves and switches are ready made. Straight sections 

 are 6 feet to 20 feet long. 



(b) Regular, fixed track. 



1. Rail. The form is usually the T rail. Grooved rails, flat rails, rails inclined toward center of 

 track, &c. are freaks merely. In logging railroads the rails are often fastened lengthwise on 

 sawn or hewn stringers, which arrangement allows of light rail. The gauge is measured inside 

 the tops of the rails if the flange is inside, and outside the rails if the flange is outside. If 

 the wheel has a double flange, measure from center to center of rails. 



