Western Railroad Discussion > Is this a old time spike?

 Located on Smart Train ROW in Marin County, California. Dollar bill placed next to it for size comparison. I'm only accustomed to newer spikes and am guessing this is a particularly old one. Still, it may be something else. TIA. 

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Paul Bunyan's toothpick.

mapboy

Something else. It's not a track spike.

That is the pin that holds a brake shoe in place. 

Brake shoe key.

Exprail

One dollar bill!

A brake shoe key indeed.  Illustrated below, it holds the brake shoe to the brake head on all cars and locomotives. (Nearly all - there are some disc brakes)  Brake shoes are easily replaced in a matter of minutes.  If necessary to adjust the slack in the linkage it takes a few more minutes.  Part of the daily inspection on every train is to check the brake shoe thickness.  The one in the OP is pretty rusted so the carman probably tossed it and put in a brand new one.

This is a part that hasn't changed in design in 150 years.

-LD



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/06/20 14:16 by LarryDoyle.

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That is a tapered brake shoe key, probably mis-applied to a composition shoe car.  The design has changed because the tapered ones (like this one)  were designed for Iron shoes.  They tended to work out and fall off when applied to composition shoes, resulting in loss of the brake shoe.  Modern shoe keys are made from a spring steel and are not tapered like the one shown.

Donate it to the staff at the Northwestern Pacific Railroad Historical Society in Petaluma:

http://www.nwprrhs.org/

Dave