it seems prototype ties are proportional to the distance between the rails.
what is most common for turnouts in 1900s?
greg - Philadelphia & Reading / Reading
I think it would depend on the quality of the track that was built, plus also the chosen style of the builder. That is: there would likely be a variety of designs.
That said, if you study the following picture from 1900, you will note that the switch ties are based on standardised lengths. Hence the saw-tooth outline of the ends.
You will also see that the switch ties never project beyond the outside of the rail LESS than they do for plain track--they're always the same or longer.
http://www.shorpy.com/node/9577?size=_original
Ed
the photo is a good example of the era of turnout i'm interested in. It doesn't have a cast frog, the frog is made from the rails and i'll guess that it was built in place, not preassembled.
as you meant to say, the staircase look of ties suggests that the ties are in fixed lengths, not cut to size so that they extend past the rails a fixed amount.
an 8' tie should extend past the 5.5" rails spaced 4'8.5" by 17"
based on the photo, i'll guess that ties come in 2' increment, extending an extra foot on each side.
so is the answer to my question, for that era: 8, 10, 12, 14 and 16'?
gregcso is the answer to my question, for that era: 8, 10, 12, 14 and 16'?
Please memorize this chart. There will be a test on Monday!
BandO_ties by Edmund, on Flickr
Nothing was left to chance. The railroads employed teams of engineers and as engineers are prone to do, they measure and chart everything!
BandO_turnouts_0001 by Edmund, on Flickr
BandO_turnouts by Edmund, on Flickr
These date to 1906-1907, should be close enough to your 1900 era. Manganese steel frogs, sometimes called "Bessemer Frogs" were just being developed in this time frame. They weren't adopted overnight.
Good Luck, Ed
thanks
i think that last image is what I'm looking for and more. I appreciate you posting the others.