Are there any other spiking tools available besides the rare Kadee and the one offered by Switch Crafters? I’ve started spiking my code 250 aluminium rail using needle nosed pliers and its a bit tedious particularly when I hit some harder wood that I’ve used for my ties.
Dave
So how much are the rare Kadee spikers going for now-a-days ?
I wasn’t aware that Kadee spikers were able to be used on large scale track. I’ve used one 30 years ago on HO and it could only be set up for code 100 or code 70.
Wouldn’t you think with todays air nailers someone would have come up with a conversion?
Mike
Mike Helphinstine said:Hi Mike,
I wasn't aware that Kadee spikers were able to be used on large scale track. I've used one 30 years ago on HO and it could only be set up for code 100 or code 70. Wouldn't you think with todays air nailers someone would have come up with a conversion? Mike
I looked at converting a pneumatic stapler to a large scale version of the Kadee twin spiker several years ago - and recently revisited the idea about six months ago.
The conversion itself would not be difficult - requires hardened steel guides, a hardened shear to remove the central portion of the staple, and a “split” drive pin to set the two resulting spikes.
The problem is that no one manufactures a stapler to drive staples/spikes of the proper width! To get the thing to work, there can be no more than 0.004-0.005" of play between the base of the rail and the inside surface of the “spike” or the spike can twist on insertion and force the rail out of gauge. Commonly available pneumatic staples are 0.25" wide (too narrow), or 7/16" and 1/2" wide (too wide) - this is true for codes 197, 215, both flavors of code 250, and code 332.
If you wanted to go this route, you would have to pick a stapler/staples, design and build the converted spiker, then have rail custom extruded to fit the resulting spikes! Given that the world has two basic rail size standards in large scale, it didn’t make much sense to pursue the idea.
However, if you were going to build a very large railroad for yourself, or for a club system - and I’m talking 12,000+ feet of rail here - it would be worth it in the long run. Once you pay for the extrusion die (~ $1,000), the cost of the actual rail drops substantially for quantities over 12,000 feet - this is for aluminum,T6061 alloy. I never priced out brass or nickel silver, stainless steel, but I’d bet the same economies of scale would result. I’m only talking about the cost of the rail/spikes here (you can easily find stainless steel staples, btw) - if you factor in the labor and time savings, the entire dynamic changes.
Brian
Walpole, MA
I remember reading on one of the forums where someone modified an air-powered brad nailer to spike rail in place. I wish I could remember where, but perhaps a search of the various ones would turn something up. LSC and MLS would be my first two thoughts, then maybe search the 1:20 Yahoo group archives.
Later,
K
Hi Kevin,
I remember that brad nailer - but I also can’t remember where I saw it. Such a beast would certainly speed things up. The one thing I can recall thinking is that the author would have been well served to utilize stainless steel brads as the life expectancy of 18 ga brads outdoors is probably measured in months (weeks if you’re using the newer pressure treated wood for ties).
If I recall correctly, the modification was an indexing pin or arm to consistently place the brad on the base of the rail.
I’ll see if I can find the posting.
Brian