Hum. It’s an old carpenter’s trick to blunt the head of a nail on concrete before driving it, to avoid splitting the wood. The blunt head mashes the wood fibers rather than separating them. While they are harder to drive, I use the ME #30-110 Chisel tip spikes where I need holding power yet want avoid splitting the tie.
Lots of theories out there! Roger Nulton From: Ed Sent: Sunday, March 25, 2012 9:28 AM To: [email protected] Subject: {S-Scale List} Tweaking Spikes > I sit with a pair of nippers and cut the heads roughly in half. > Ed Kozlowsky Gents..... Ready for some one-upsmanship? There is a local HO fellow here that used to hand file the points on spikes before using them. He felt this was needed to prevent splitting of wood ties. Sharp points worked much better in his opinion and the problem of split ties went away. His effort applied only to the older Walthers spikes which apparently had blunt almost-points. He got so unhappy doing this that he called up Walthers and read them the riot act and sent them samples of "good" spikes and "bad" spikes along with a report that explains why things like that are important. Within a year, the new improved Walthers spikes came out and all the handlaying track guys are now smiling. The new spikes are also longer and liked by some S guys as well. Just goes to show that being helpful usually gets better end results than merely complaining. Cheers...Ed L.
