In alt.home.repair, on Sun, 02 Aug 2015 10:53:19 -0400,
wrote:

On Sun, 02 Aug 2015 10:15:02 -0400, micky
wrote:

Creosote and railroad ties

AIUI, creosote doesn't prevent rot, it merely deters it, that is, slows
it down or delays it (and not as well as arsenic products).

So what about railroad ties.

They seem to last for 50 or 100 years or more. Do they have to be
replaced because of rot? All of them? If not all of them, does that
mean that the creosote stopped them from rotting?

Or do they replace them all, when I'm not looking?

If they last for 100 years when used for railroad ties, how come they
don't last that long when used to support decks, etc.?

I meant, as you probably all guessed, how come the wood used for decks
doesn't last as long as railroad ties. Not that ties are used to hold
up decks.

I think the issue with creosote was environmental, not how effective
it was. Railroad ties were on railroad property where people were not
supposed to go in the first place so they let them get away with it
longer than things people put in their yards. I have some creosote
dock posts that have been in salt water for 50 years and they may have
been discarded telephone poles at the time. They are pretty well gone
but they lasted twice as long as 2.5 CCA PT.

So the answer is half-way between. They stil rot.

Just what I needed to know.

Thank you all.

P.S. I do still see wooden ties at least two of the places I go. One
is the Monocasy Battlefiled just south of Frederick Maryland, where the
railroad tracks run right through the battle area. And another is near
the Thomas Viaduct, where the famous race between a railroad engine and
a horse took place. I've been to both of these places in the last two
months and I'm 99.9% sure the ties were of wood. Some of these tracks
are used some but not very much.