ties, the changes have been so great that the matter has been greatly complicated.

As to the propriety of using a 6-inch tie for making a test, I doubt it. Mr. Burton-Mr. Courtenay has spoken of the difficulty of getting satisfactory data; the Committee fully appreciates this fact. We would be very glad to receive data from the L. & N. or any other railroad which has not furnished it. Last year we tried to obtain information about the cypress ties on the L. & N., but did not receive reply containing it. We realize that this whole subject is one which, with our present knowledge, cannot be treated as though mathematically exact.

As regards the comparison between white oak and cypress in column 1, the white oak is shown as 75, which corresponds to six years. The cypress is shown as 90, which corresponds to 7.2 years. The interval may not be large enough between the white oak and cypress, but the 90 is arrived at from the returns which the Committee received last year, which included, in the case of cypress, returns from fifteen or twenty roads.

As regards the choice between the six-inch and the seven-inch test ties, the Committee has had considerable discussion. At first it considered the possible use of both the 6 and the 7-inch ties, but this seemed to defeat the purpose of the standard, and we finally decided on the 6-inch 8-foot tie, because of its shorter life as compared with the 7-inch tie, and because therefore we will obtain results more quickly. A further consideration was that the 6-inch tie is more largely used, as shown by the returns to the Committee, and it is, perhaps, the tie which is most largely used, taking the country as a whole.

The standard size, particularly in the West and Middle West, has been 6-inch by 8-inch by 8 feet. The Committee felt, while it was not the best tie, perhaps it might be the best we could select for a standard test tie.

Mr. Courtenay:-I can furnish reliable data on ties laid years ago. Our lines extend from the Ohio and the Mississippi River to New Orleans. On the Gulf Coast, between Mobile and New Orleans, it is hardly worth while to put a white oak tie in. It is hardly worth while putting in a long leaf yellow pine tie unless it is treated, but the cypress tic will give long life in that section.

It is a difficult thing to do, and it will cost a tremendous amount of money to give precise figures as to the life of ties. Since we have been treating ties with creosote oil and chloride of zinc, and distributing them all over the system, mostly due to the great difficulty of getting ties in the last few years, we had a number of them taken out, but we have no record what ties were taken out, and I think it would be a matter of very great value to the railroad if we could get accurate statistics about the life of ties on our own road, and about the only way to do it is to keep a life record of each individual tie, which is a rather large job, and particularly as you will have to rely upon the foreman to do that. Fore

men's talents do not lie in that direction, and it is practically impossible today to get the data on the life of the different kinds of ties. Anyone who has used ties extensively knows perfectly well that white oak will last longer than any other type of tie in some territories. The same thing applies to other species, and cypress is the tie which gives the longest life in the extreme South under light traffic.

A good deal has been said about standardization of specifications for cross-ties. That would be useless unless the instructions for inspecting the ties were also standardized, as the inspectors themselves are standardized, which is an impossibility.

Mr. F. J. Stimson ( Pennsylvania:-I understood Mr. Burton to say they adopted the six-inch tie as a standard because it was of shorter life than the seven-inch tie. In looking at Table I, I understand that the table shows the same life for the six-inch white oak as the seven-inch white oak. Mr. Burton's statement that the life of the tie is controlled by the element of decay is correct, but I cannot see any reference to that in this table.

Mr. Burton:-The statistics as reported by the roads do show exactly that. It is accounted for by the fact that the larger ties in general are used on roads of heavy traffic; they are worn out, and this is reflected in Table I to a certain extent. Although the reports indicated that the ties failed to decay, actually the decay is facilitated by the wear, and inconsistency does appear at times. We came to this conclusion by asking for opinions on the point, and we also averaged the data furnished to us, these results being given in the top paragraph on page 237.

Mr. W. R. Armstrong (Oregon Short Line):-What application will this have to western roads that do not have any oak ties, and do not use six-inch ties? I do not see any use for a standard of that kind for a large proportion of the roads of the country.

The President:-The idea is that the standard tie be used for testing, and not to adopt the standard tie for the road.

Mr. Burton: The Committee would suggest Mr. Armstrong might purchase and try out perhaps 100 white oak ties, to determine what Salt Lake's climate is, measured in terms of these ties. Once you find this out you put your results in on a basis comparable with the results in other parts of the country, whatever may be the kind of tie commonly used. The idea is to make the reports from different roads in widely scattered parts of the country comparable.

The purpose of a specification is to secure material of like kind or of a definite kind, so that when you specify a certain grade of ties, for example, you obtain a certain definite quality. If the white oak specification does not do this, it is the fault of the specification, but the Committee, with the information it has, believes white oak is the best for the standard test tie.

Mr. C. M. Taylor (Philadelphia & Reading) :-Is it the thought of the Committee that the test track program, described in section d, on page

235, indicates the life of the ties on the average, or just the test tie section alone?

Mr. Burton-The Committee is recommending as part of its next year's assignment, a revision of the instructions for the test sections, and. I believe one of the points brought out will be that the test section should be so selected as to be representative of the road as a whole.

Mr. G. J. Ray (Delaware, Lackawanna & Western) :—On page 239, columns 1 and 3, are somewhat in confusion. For instance, I do not understand why, in the case of redwood ties, that the six-inch tie will show 1.42, whereas the seven-inch tie will show only 1.17, as compared with the white oak. It also shows that the redwood seven-inch tie compares favorably with the white oak seven-inch tie.

Mr. Burton:-That is explained, I think, by the fact that Table I is prepared from the returns without any hand picking on the part of the Committee, that is, we have not gone behind the face of the returns. We explained a moment ago that in general the larger ties are used by roads of heavy traffic, and while Table I is intended only to represent decay, we know the decay is influenced by the amount of wear and the wear by the heavy traffic.

Mr. J. L. Campbell (El Paso & Southwestern) :-The ratio of durability of redwood ties given in these tables, compared with the white oak, are surprisingly low on the basis of the quality of redwood that used to be secured, but is not low on the basis of some redwood ties secured in these days. When the Southern Pacific track was laid through El Paso forty years ago, redwood ties were used exclusively. They remained in the track for twenty-five years and were finally removed on account of rail cutting. I do not recall seeing decay in any of them. In 1912 we laid about 18 miles of track with redwood ties. In ballasting that track eight years afterwards many of these ties were found failing by decay. There is a wide variation in the durability of redwood as between the butt and the top of the tree. Such variation will enter into an investigation of this kind if various kinds of redwood are used.

Mr. Burton:-The data relating to redwood is not of sufficient quantity to make it satisfactory, as there is only one road reporting the use of this material. The Southern Pacific Company, Pacific System, reported the use of seven-inch redwood ties which lasted eleven years, as against the average of eight years the country over for the white oak ties. The difference is not great, and if more roads reported we would have somewhat higher figures for the redwood, I believe.

Mr. F. J. Angier (Baltimore & Ohio) :-My understanding is that you are basing the different ties on 6x8-inch white oak ties, giving a certain length of time. What kind of white oak tie is it? Northern, southern, chestnut oak, what species of oak is it? Is it a heart oak or a sap oak? What are we to use, as a white oak tie, to base the other ties upon?

Mr. Burton: I think Mr. Angier's question is a proper one to ask, and I would call attention to the specifications for white oak ties contained in last year's report, which specify the proportion of heart and sap.

Mr. G. J. Ray (Delaware, Lackawanna & Western):-If the Union Pacific were to buy a thousand of these test ties, and get them from New Jersey or Pennsylvania, and insert these in tracks, and use on one of their parallel tracks the same number of ties from the southern part of Virginia, they would be more than likely to get at least two or three years' difference in the life of the test ties. There is no question about it. We have had that experience with white oak ties all over the country, so that it does seem to me that the Committee must be careful about recording correct information. They must get the information at least as to where the ties came from, as there is a great difference in white oak grown in Pennsylvania or New Jersey, from the white oak grown in the southern part of the country.

Mr. Burton: The Committee realizes that something of the kind may be a fact, but the question is, What ought we to do? We have a specification which says that a certain thing specified is what we want for white oak. Possibly the specification should be modified to call a white oak tie one thing north of the Mason and Dixon line, and something else south of it.

Mr. Angier:-Specify Virginia white oak.

Mr. Burton-Don't you further complicate it by having a definite understanding of what Virginia white oak is?

Mr. Angier:-Many of us can remember when white oak gave us a life of ten or eleven years. The white oak today is not giving over six years' life. Thirty-three per cent are sapwood, and they are not lasting over four years. We should specify that the tie should be all heart or should be from a certain part of the country.

Mr. Burton:-The Committee would like a suggestion from Mr. Angier or anybody else as to what would be the best tie made standard. As regards sap, the specifications adopted by this Association classify heart white oak, Class U, and sap white oak is shown in Class T. The specification further details just what a heart tie is and what a sap tie is.

As regard the part of the country from which the tie is procured, that is another matter. If the same species from points in the south is greatly different from points in the north, possibly the specifications should be further modified.

Mr. John R. Leighty (Presidents' Conference Committee) :-It is entirely possible that the plan the Committee has outlined will establish what seems to be a very valuable factor for equating the service life of timber of the same species from different parts of the country, if, for instance, you have some Virginia oak used by one railroad and some Ohio oak used by another railroad in the same climatic territory, and under similar traffic conditions. It seems to me you have made a step towards developing an equation factor which would enable you to measure the life of ties from one part of the country against that of ties from another part of the country, which would be a very valuable factor, when it is derived. It is entirely possible that a railroad could afford to pay considerable

money to get a tie that would last more years, and this plan you have outlined, I think, will lead you to the information necessary for determining what might be done along that line.

The President:-We will now vote on the recommendations found on page 238.

(The recommendations were put to vote and unanimously adopted.) Chairman Clark:-The Chairman of Sub-Committee No. 3 on Substitute Ties is unavoidably absent.

(Mr. Clark abstracted the Appendix B on Substitute Ties.) Chairman Clark:-Sub-Committee No. 4 reports progress.

Subject No. 6 is "The effect of design of tie plates and track spikes on the durability of cross-ties and results of improperly protecting ties from mechanical wear." Mr. Layng will present this report.

Mr. F. R. Layng (Bessemer & Lake Erie) :-The Committee has had this subject assigned to it for a number of years, and on page 259 we have recapitulated the work contained in previous reports, and we have tried on page 260 and 261 to briefly state the information the Committee now has in hand on this subject, with the idea of expressing what has been learned by this study, and with the thought that the Committee, for the present at least, can discontinue the study of the subject, having covered the subject as far as it is possible at this time.

I move that this report be received as information and the subject be discontinued.

The President:-I think the question of discontinuance of the subject is matter for the Committee on Outline of Work to consider, and the motion will be that the report be received by this convention as information.

(The motion was seconded, put to vote and carried.)

The President:-That completes the Committee's report, except for the recommendations for next year. The Committee is dismissed with the thanks of the Association.