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Message:: [QUOTE="Burky, post: 299257, member: 1757"]There are still uses for the shorter pieces of rail, typically carried in 40 foot lengths. Many branches and sidings are constructed with that type of rail, often rail removed from mainline service as they upgrade. But the major railroads use as much of the welded rail as they can. They have machines that are set up to automate as much of the track laying process as possible, and they use them with the longer strings of rail. Putting in the older jointed rail is much more labor intensive, and as you can see from the figures I posted (assuming you believe them! LOL!!!) the cost of labor to put in rail is very high. And, in maintenance terms, it is much harder on the equipment to hit a joint every 40 foot than it is to cross one every 1320 feet. And with a good quality weld, it's possible to make a seam that is almost undetectable to the operator of the equipment. And that adds lifespan to the engines and cars. Just like a regular car, the rougher the road, the faster parts tend to wear out. Old rail lasts a long time. A couple of months ago I was in a railyard picking up some plastic pellets, and was looking at the dates stamped into the rails where I was loading. Some of the rail dated back to 1919, and a lot of the rail in that yard was from 1923. I'm sure that in times past, that rail was used in mainline service and had been transferred to siding work as tracks were rebuilt and upgraded.[/QUOTE]