I've seen several tie replacement videos and this one is by far the most coherent explanation of how it's done. And that crew were really moving along. Thanks!
@richardcarlson582 . When I worked these 20 years or so ago, we could install around 8000 to 10000 ties a day. This only happens when there are many ties in each mile of track. The more spread out the replacement ties happen to be, the less production you would experience. Walking 15 to 20 miles a day wasn't unheard of with limited tie replacement. Oh and that was when I worked on the wood tie gangs. Concrete tie gangs were so much different. New tracks were laid with a huge machine laying on tie at a time under it, while riding on caterpillar type tracks on the front of the machine and the rear ran on the rail that was being forced onto the ties after they were placed on the ground. The huge machine pulled many flat cars filled with concrete ties.
@@SD457500 St. Cloud. The gang has been working on a spur that runs into the western industrial park where the old repair yard and roundhouse once resided.
@rsinclair6560 @rsinclair6560 . I agree with most of what you said. Steel ties are basically added to make the gauge of the track remain constant. They are worthless to tamp. I don't remember the name of the wood I talked about that had to be drilled with a diamond tipped drill bit. I can remember the machine that drilled the 4 holes next to the rail at the same time. I also remember seeing that machine operator change drill bits quite often. Usually, those ties would come to a job site predrilled, but on occasion, severel wouldn't be drilled. Concrete has its place. Of the two, wood is a lot easier to work with, but concrete typically lasts longer. Recently, I have seen on different rail sites the inner workings for the concrete tie placement gang, a wood tie gang, and a rail gang. If I see them again, I will share them on RUclips and mention your handle so you get alerted, IF YOU WISH.
Awesome part two tie replacement video. Took me back to my railroad days back on the CP. Enjoyed watching once again and have a wonderful rest of your Tuesday. Steve
Glad you enjoyed it, and that it brought back some good memories for you. It was so neat to watch the entire process, and how quickly they moved along the tracks.
@@SD457500 Your very welcome, I worked on the rail gang also a couple times in my career laying 1400 ft strings of welded rail mostly along the CP River Sub and the Twin Cities. I posted a photo of a local railfan that took my photo cleaning switches out when he was scanning his slides over the weekend and sent it to me which is on our community post.
That they are, but they do the entire railbed, and rails all at once. This just required the replacement of new ties. Those machines over there are cool, but also not made for the heavy duty applications of track in North America. Thanks for the comment, and watching!
@@SD457500 "but also not made for the heavy duty applications of track in North America" sorry but WHAT?? The only reason you dont see them in the US is because they are expensieve. Our railssystem isnt privatly owned and dus maintenance is a goverment payed process. Those big machines are a lot faster and they are heavy duty
@MarcH0lland No, tracks in Europe are not built to the same heavy duty standards. Ballast depth is different, rail weight, tie spacing, etc. Sure, you can likely run faster on it, but watch what happens when you try and run a two mile freight train over it.
@@SD457500 its not about the length but it is about weight per axle. 22T (metric) is allowed. the length is reduced because we dont have yards and sidings that long. I have driven steel trains of 5500T with 6 axle wagons. They are heavy. Key is a balance of weight and speed
Those tie inserters have so much force, that when the track crew I mentioned some time ago came through, they broke 3 ties in a 150ft span...3 NEW ties....also, as mentioned in my last comment when I came by to read comments, something else kinda maintenance related is that my town is not known for railroad history...CSX kinda changed that, as they donated a 40ft steel sided boxcar ACL 20767 to the Fort Wayne Railroad Historical society...yes, the same people with the NKP 765, and 358. The boxcar was used as a tool car and storage in town for the last 39 years as part of the railroad's maintenance of way department. It sat on a 500ft stretch of abandoned track, the respective switch was taken out after a derailment in the late 70's, early 80's...sometime between then because in what lil' footage of that derailment exists, C40-8w's are used.
That's a LOT of force going on those ties to break a new one! I bet the machine wasn't calibrated properly, or the operator was grabbing them wrong. :/ Thanks for watching!
@lfeco . Trust me. When I first started at a laborer years ago, we worked on a section crew with other section crews helping. We were required to uninstall and completely install 10 ties per man per day. Absolutely, everything was done by hand. The only thing that we did use that would be considered mechanical was track jacks that you carried from location to location, hand jacked to raise the rails. Everything else was manual labor, including spiking
BNSF seriously needs to do tie replacement on the Hinckley subdivision. Some of the ties on that line are up to 20 years old and railfaning there every day i’ve seen those ties start to show their age for a while now
I know they did a large tie project a number of years ago after the 261 ran on it. There were some really low joints. Whereabouts along the line is needing some TLC these days?
Not really; different type of railroads and items hauled. Railroads in Europe are made for lighter passenger trains, not heavy haul freight trains. While the automation of the equipment over there is cool, it isn't suited for the tonnage and ops that North America has. Thanks for watching!
Every time we have a tie gang scheduled for our area, the same routine happens every time... 1st ballast train comes and dumps new rock, then the regulator clears it, tie gang does their jobs and finally a tamper and regulator finishes the job. (I have never not seen the regulator run ahead of the gang.)
@erict5234 . Must dump rock first because most times a lot of rock either isn't on the track to begin with or the surfacing gang behind the tie gang wouldn't have enough to smooth the track and stabilize it.
Spot on! Once they dropped the rock, the ties were dropped just a few weeks later. Its amazing how mechanized this process it, and even more so to think this was all was done by hand. Thanks for watching!
I'm sure something like this exists for that gauge, or one could modify equipment like this for that application! Thanks for the comment, and watching.
Whoooops, I appear to have missed one of the machines. You can see the plates being placed with the track broom though. Hope you enjoyed the video, and thanks for watching!
@@SD457500 The guys walking along pickup the plates and set on end of the ties, the rail lifter follows behind them. Those guys lift up the rails and slide the plates under, then comes the spikers.
You guys in the US are sooooo far behind the rest of the world with access to track machinary. Here in the UK, we use 1 long piece of equipment to lift track, remove old stone and put new stone in place, then lower track and lastly a tamper follows. So instead of 100 people working on the track, we have about 30 working on track replacement.
While the UK might have that, the size and scale of trains over there are much smaller. Trains in the UK are lighter, and not nearly as long as trains in North America. Its a very different way to approach to railroading, and requires different machines. Appreciate the kind, informative comment, and thanks for watching!
@@SD457500Union Pacific uses it on their mainline in Nebraska when replacing the concrete ties. Currently Amtrak is using on on the Harrisburg line to upgrade their old wood ties and spikes to much newer, and more reliable concrete ties and tie clips
I saw a few minor breakdowns while I was filming this. They had a number of parts on hand, and fixed the issue in a matter of minutes. Thanks for watching!
@Memphisdoug . After the new tie is installed, another machine installs the metal plates between the rails and the ties on both ends, then the tamper comes and tamps the ties tight to the rail. Then the spikers come and spike the rail to the tie.
Concrete has its place, as do wooden ties, and it depends on the climate. We have concrete ties in a few places around here, but due to the climate here, wooden ones tend to last longer. Thanks for the comment, and watching!
@abecoulter8550 . Yes. Concrete ties are supposed to last longer but I was told only 50 years. That all depends on the track conditions, the constant changing weather and how much the ties need to be maintained such as resurfacing or derailments. Wood ties also have a life expectancy depending on the type of wood, weather conditions, maintainance required and derailments. There is one wood that is so hard, it takes a diamond tipped drill bit to drill a hole so a spiker who pushes spikes into the tie can push in a spike without bending the spike. Most spikers have the ability to pound spikes in similar to a hammer drill. But with these predrilled hard wood ties, the spikes must be pushed in with one smooth motion, no hammer pounding with the spiker. And even then, the spikes could bend very easily. Hand hammering in these predrilled ties is nearly impossible because the wood is that hard.
@@daveschmitt4499This is interesting. What is the species of tree? In southern Australian States, River Red Gun, was always used (eucalyptus camaldulensis). Usually Victoria and New South Wales. No treatment necessary and life expectancy of 25 years. Some sawmills cut Iron Bark (Eucalyptus crebra), the name speaks for itself..beautiful timber. BHP Broken Hill Propietry steel makers made a pressed steel sleeper (tie for you American good folk). Last forever but hard to tamp particularly they are open hollow underneath and blue stone rock ballast does not 'grip', the ballast moves as train moves over the top . Timber sleepers are great in build up residential areas as they absorb the rail noise. Concrete is the go. Very long life and expensive. Deeper in profile and heavy which is a problem if they replace wood. Side insertion can scrape the compacted original compacted rail base and cuts through the slight engineered transverse slope to drain water. The concrete insertion destroys the compacted drainage surface and you end up a track with big drainage problems the sleepers sink in mud and rail surface very random uneven. Heavy speed restrictions to avoid derailments. Concrete are suitable for total track reconstruction when formation is prepared and compacted. Do it once, do it right.
@SD457500 . There was a missing machine. A machine would typically raise the rail so someone or a couple of maintenance of way employees could slide the plates under the rail on each end of the new tie. Back in my day we first used track jacks or pry bars. Then came machines that clamped both rails, a piston jack would raise the rails by pushing down on the ground, then there was a stick like attachment with prongs on the bottom of the stick to place in the spike holes on the outside of the rail to slide the plate under the rail. Then the pistons were released, the clamps unclamped and the machine was either pushed forward to button control, powered forward. And NATURALLY the piece of equipment i showed someone several weeks ago, I can't find now, lol.
I've seen several tie replacement videos and this one is by far the most coherent explanation of how it's done. And that crew were really moving along. Thanks!
@richardcarlson582 . When I worked these 20 years or so ago, we could install around 8000 to 10000 ties a day. This only happens when there are many ties in each mile of track. The more spread out the replacement ties happen to be, the less production you would experience. Walking 15 to 20 miles a day wasn't unheard of with limited tie replacement. Oh and that was when I worked on the wood tie gangs.
Concrete tie gangs were so much different. New tracks were laid with a huge machine laying on tie at a time under it, while riding on caterpillar type tracks on the front of the machine and the rear ran on the rail that was being forced onto the ties after they were placed on the ground. The huge machine pulled many flat cars filled with concrete ties.
Thank you so very much for the kind words! I was aiming to make it succinct, informative, and interesting to watch. Glad you enjoyed it!!
Best video of the day. I've seen this locally recently.
Great to hear! Locally as in the Twin Cities? This same track gang is slowly working east; its so cool to see.
@@SD457500 St. Cloud. The gang has been working on a spur that runs into the western industrial park where the old repair yard and roundhouse once resided.
Sweet I love them mow machines
They are so cool to watch in action. I can only wonder how many engineering hours went into each one of them. Thanks for watching!
I also enjoy the old gandy dancing documentaries as a comparison.
@rsinclair6560 @rsinclair6560 . I agree with most of what you said. Steel ties are basically added to make the gauge of the track remain constant. They are worthless to tamp. I don't remember the name of the wood I talked about that had to be drilled with a diamond tipped drill bit. I can remember the machine that drilled the 4 holes next to the rail at the same time. I also remember seeing that machine operator change drill bits quite often. Usually, those ties would come to a job site predrilled, but on occasion, severel wouldn't be drilled.
Concrete has its place. Of the two, wood is a lot easier to work with, but concrete typically lasts longer.
Recently, I have seen on different rail sites the inner workings for the concrete tie placement gang, a wood tie gang, and a rail gang. If I see them again, I will share them on RUclips and mention your handle so you get alerted, IF YOU WISH.
Isn't it amazing how they used to do it, compared to the modern methods? Thanks for the comment, and watching!
Awesome part two tie replacement video. Took me back to my railroad days back on the CP. Enjoyed watching once again and have a wonderful rest of your Tuesday. Steve
Glad you enjoyed it, and that it brought back some good memories for you. It was so neat to watch the entire process, and how quickly they moved along the tracks.
@@SD457500 Your very welcome, I worked on the rail gang also a couple times in my career laying 1400 ft strings of welded rail mostly along the CP River Sub and the Twin Cities. I posted a photo of a local railfan that took my photo cleaning switches out when he was scanning his slides over the weekend and sent it to me which is on our community post.
so cool to see those MOW machineries! Excellent video Douglas! ;)
Thank you very much, and glad you enjoyed it! It is so cool how quickly this entire track gang works.
It's a wonder of tech!
It sure is! I can only imagine what other, new designs, are in the works. Thanks for the comment!
On Europe's tracks all the steps are done within one machine
That they are, but they do the entire railbed, and rails all at once. This just required the replacement of new ties. Those machines over there are cool, but also not made for the heavy duty applications of track in North America. Thanks for the comment, and watching!
@@SD457500 They're dual-use. sometimes just the small job replacing the ties, otherwise the big work including the tracks
@@SD457500 "but also not made for the heavy duty applications of track in North America" sorry but WHAT?? The only reason you dont see them in the US is because they are expensieve. Our railssystem isnt privatly owned and dus maintenance is a goverment payed process. Those big machines are a lot faster and they are heavy duty
@MarcH0lland No, tracks in Europe are not built to the same heavy duty standards. Ballast depth is different, rail weight, tie spacing, etc. Sure, you can likely run faster on it, but watch what happens when you try and run a two mile freight train over it.
@@SD457500 its not about the length but it is about weight per axle. 22T (metric) is allowed. the length is reduced because we dont have yards and sidings that long.
I have driven steel trains of 5500T with 6 axle wagons. They are heavy. Key is a balance of weight and speed
Those tie inserters have so much force, that when the track crew I mentioned some time ago came through, they broke 3 ties in a 150ft span...3 NEW ties....also, as mentioned in my last comment when I came by to read comments, something else kinda maintenance related is that my town is not known for railroad history...CSX kinda changed that, as they donated a 40ft steel sided boxcar ACL 20767 to the Fort Wayne Railroad Historical society...yes, the same people with the NKP 765, and 358. The boxcar was used as a tool car and storage in town for the last 39 years as part of the railroad's maintenance of way department. It sat on a 500ft stretch of abandoned track, the respective switch was taken out after a derailment in the late 70's, early 80's...sometime between then because in what lil' footage of that derailment exists, C40-8w's are used.
That's a LOT of force going on those ties to break a new one! I bet the machine wasn't calibrated properly, or the operator was grabbing them wrong. :/ Thanks for watching!
Informative as always!
Glad it was informative, and thanks for watching!
Enjoyed that. Doing this the old way would have been a hard job.
Doing this the old way would have been a TASK! Thanks for watching!
@lfeco . Trust me. When I first started at a laborer years ago, we worked on a section crew with other section crews helping. We were required to uninstall and completely install 10 ties per man per day. Absolutely, everything was done by hand. The only thing that we did use that would be considered mechanical was track jacks that you carried from location to location, hand jacked to raise the rails. Everything else was manual labor, including spiking
Great video!
Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for watching, and great to hear that you enjoyed the video!
BNSF seriously needs to do tie replacement on the Hinckley subdivision. Some of the ties on that line are up to 20 years old and railfaning there every day i’ve seen those ties start to show their age for a while now
I know they did a large tie project a number of years ago after the 261 ran on it. There were some really low joints. Whereabouts along the line is needing some TLC these days?
Cool
Thanks for watching!
So ancient compared to European systems
Not really; different type of railroads and items hauled. Railroads in Europe are made for lighter passenger trains, not heavy haul freight trains. While the automation of the equipment over there is cool, it isn't suited for the tonnage and ops that North America has. Thanks for watching!
Good Stuff👍😁OperateOnOperator
Glad you enjoyed the video; this was a neat and cool operation to see.
Every time we have a tie gang scheduled for our area, the same routine happens every time... 1st ballast train comes and dumps new rock, then the regulator clears it, tie gang does their jobs and finally a tamper and regulator finishes the job. (I have never not seen the regulator run ahead of the gang.)
@erict5234 . Must dump rock first because most times a lot of rock either isn't on the track to begin with or the surfacing gang behind the tie gang wouldn't have enough to smooth the track and stabilize it.
@@daveschmitt4499 correct.
Spot on! Once they dropped the rock, the ties were dropped just a few weeks later. Its amazing how mechanized this process it, and even more so to think this was all was done by hand. Thanks for watching!
Thx. What CPKC Subdivision?
This is on the Withrow Sub, over in NE Mpls. Thanks for watching!
@SD457500 Thx. Not familiar with that Sub.
Think of Shoreham Hill; that area.
@@SD457500. When were they in that area and which direction were they headed
@@daveschmitt4499 This was last week, and they were heading east. I *think* they are still heading east towards Withrow or down towards Soo Jct.
Do they have this equipment in 36" narrow Gauge? asking for Disneyland and Knott's and Cedar Fair 7:43 😊
I'm sure something like this exists for that gauge, or one could modify equipment like this for that application! Thanks for the comment, and watching.
You skipped the part on how the plates are reinstalled under the rail using the rail lifter .
This has to happen "before" spiking can begin. 😮
Whoooops, I appear to have missed one of the machines. You can see the plates being placed with the track broom though. Hope you enjoyed the video, and thanks for watching!
@@SD457500
The guys walking along pickup the plates and set on end of the ties, the rail lifter follows behind them.
Those guys lift up the rails and slide the plates under, then comes the spikers.
You guys in the US are sooooo far behind the rest of the world with access to track machinary. Here in the UK, we use 1 long piece of equipment to lift track, remove old stone and put new stone in place, then lower track and lastly a tamper follows. So instead of 100 people working on the track, we have about 30 working on track replacement.
While the UK might have that, the size and scale of trains over there are much smaller. Trains in the UK are lighter, and not nearly as long as trains in North America. Its a very different way to approach to railroading, and requires different machines. Appreciate the kind, informative comment, and thanks for watching!
@@SD457500We Americans don't
Care what the UK thinks. They are a
Bloody joke
You better see then how backward we do it in Australia.
We also have those. Mostly used in the northeast
@@SD457500Union Pacific uses it on their mainline in Nebraska when replacing the concrete ties. Currently Amtrak is using on on the Harrisburg line to upgrade their old wood ties and spikes to much newer, and more reliable concrete ties and tie clips
I bet those machines break all the time. Looks like a lot of maintenance.
Sure do. Hydraulic hoses. You also need to regularly clean engine air filter.
I saw a few minor breakdowns while I was filming this. They had a number of parts on hand, and fixed the issue in a matter of minutes. Thanks for watching!
What happens if the new tie is too low to the rail?
@Memphisdoug . After the new tie is installed, another machine installs the metal plates between the rails and the ties on both ends, then the tamper comes and tamps the ties tight to the rail. Then the spikers come and spike the rail to the tie.
It looks like @daveschmitt4499 provided a great reply on this. Thank you both for the comment on this!
why not concrete sleepers
Concrete has its place, as do wooden ties, and it depends on the climate. We have concrete ties in a few places around here, but due to the climate here, wooden ones tend to last longer. Thanks for the comment, and watching!
@abecoulter8550 . Yes. Concrete ties are supposed to last longer but I was told only 50 years. That all depends on the track conditions, the constant changing weather and how much the ties need to be maintained such as resurfacing or derailments. Wood ties also have a life expectancy depending on the type of wood, weather conditions, maintainance required and derailments.
There is one wood that is so hard, it takes a diamond tipped drill bit to drill a hole so a spiker who pushes spikes into the tie can push in a spike without bending the spike. Most spikers have the ability to pound spikes in similar to a hammer drill. But with these predrilled hard wood ties, the spikes must be pushed in with one smooth motion, no hammer pounding with the spiker. And even then, the spikes could bend very easily.
Hand hammering in these predrilled ties is nearly impossible because the wood is that hard.
@@daveschmitt4499This is interesting. What is the species of tree? In southern Australian States, River Red Gun, was always used (eucalyptus camaldulensis). Usually Victoria and New South Wales. No treatment necessary and life expectancy of 25 years. Some sawmills cut Iron Bark (Eucalyptus crebra), the name speaks for itself..beautiful timber. BHP Broken Hill Propietry steel makers made a pressed steel sleeper (tie for you American good folk). Last forever but hard to tamp particularly they are open hollow underneath and blue stone rock ballast does not 'grip', the ballast moves as train moves over the top . Timber sleepers are great in build up residential areas as they absorb the rail noise. Concrete is the go. Very long life and expensive. Deeper in profile and heavy which is a problem if they replace wood. Side insertion can scrape the compacted original compacted rail base and cuts through the slight engineered transverse slope to drain water. The concrete insertion destroys the compacted drainage surface and you end up a track with big drainage problems the sleepers sink in mud and rail surface very random uneven. Heavy speed restrictions to avoid derailments. Concrete are suitable for total track reconstruction when formation is prepared and compacted. Do it once, do it right.
It's called a Tie Gang
Appreciate the feedback on the video; I hope you enjoyed it otherwise!
@SD457500 . There was a missing machine. A machine would typically raise the rail so someone or a couple of maintenance of way employees could slide the plates under the rail on each end of the new tie. Back in my day we first used track jacks or pry bars. Then came machines that clamped both rails, a piston jack would raise the rails by pushing down on the ground, then there was a stick like attachment with prongs on the bottom of the stick to place in the spike holes on the outside of the rail to slide the plate under the rail. Then the pistons were released, the clamps unclamped and the machine was either pushed forward to button control, powered forward. And NATURALLY the piece of equipment i showed someone several weeks ago, I can't find now, lol.