Rail road spikes

ok does any one have any they want to get rid of, or does anyone know where i could get my hands on some..hopefully the high carbon ones!! thanx in advance

Ron- call your local CN Railroad office- I bet they can point you in the right direction.

How many do you need?I have a few laying around.

oh maybe 5 or 10..i make tomakawks out of them..it also depends how much you want..do you know if they are high carbon?

Let me have your address and You pay shipping.These are all marked h.c.,I was told this was high carbon.

you`ll have to wait a bit..we have a virus right now and i don`t want to e-mail anything in case we send it to someone else...we may have it killed allready though

Robert..could you e-mail your email address so i can send you my address..i would love to get some good spikes
my e-mail is.. little_hen_knives@hotmail.com
and yes we got rid of the virus...pesky little bug!!

I live in Georgia so,I will check on the cost.

I'd like to know how much you are wanting to sell these for. You can email me at: llzp@ev1.net
Larry

email address washburn@nlamerica.com

I was told that HC on the head of a railroad spike was a manufacturer's mark and not the sign of high carbon. The only way to know is either by contacting a manufacturer for specs (which they may or may not be agreeable to giving out) or spark testing them. Most I have found are either mild steel or wrought iron (which isn't a bad score in itself).

A year or two back, I was at the Abana Quad State Roundup up in Troy, Ohio. There, a fellow had a box of foot long railroad spikes with a head on each end. Come to find out that that's how they are made. There was an Ohio manufacturer's name on the box. A friend of mine in Ohio tried numerous times, in vain, to contact the company just to see if they would sell to an individual, and to determine the type of steel of which they were made. He was never allowed to talk to anyone beyond a receptionist, and no one in authority would return his calls. Guess their market is sewed up tight.

For what its worth, I have forged 2 knives recently from rail road spikes, one stamped H.C. and one not. Both were heat treated the same and the H.C. one got harder. As well to my neophyte eye, the sparkies from the H.C. spike read carbon. In the last little while I have collected well over a hundred spikes by walking a remote section of track and have only found about one in twelve stamped H.C.

ghostdog

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp I'm not saying that I'm right and anyone else is wrong, 'cause I've heard credible stories on both sides of this issue. I have *heard* that the h.c. is on some spikes due to a federal law requiring certain alloy characteristics for certain uses of the spikes, and it does mean High Carbon.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Near where I live (in an un-disclosed location... heh heh heh...) there are two fifty-gallon drums by the tracks... in one of them there are dark spikes marked H.C. and in the other one, noticably lighter in appearance and unmarked- yet more spikes. Some of the spikes in both barrels have clearly been used and yet they are separated. ( Thanks Guys!!! ) The discovery reinforced my opinion that the H.C. does indeed mean High Carbon.

The two did make a nice damascus that hardened well.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp 'bout time I took a trip back, actually... maybe I can perform some tests on them and try to see for sure.

-J. Loose

That's the fundamental problem; everybody has "heard" one thing or another, but there doesn't seem to be any available criteria with which to prove one way or another what everybody has heard. Man, I'd love to get a hold of some spec sheets on some of these spikes. Sometimes I think it would be less difficult getting blueprints on a Stealth Bomber. I've seen some that have HCX on the heads. Any thoughts on that marking?

HCX...?

Boink. Got me. High Carbon Xylophone?

I got my info from someone on the Swordforum Bladesmith Cafe- went to look it up but apparently everything got eaten by the dog at some point. As I recall they had some documentation and I think they may have addressed the HCX thing- but it is still a case of hearsay...

I'll grab some more when the snow melts in a week or two. We can test 'em.

HEY RON! (way up there...) Gimmee shipping and I'll send you some of both kinds. If you're interested give me an E-mail- I'll let you know when I go Spike-hunting....