Railroad tie plates

I agree with Normark.........I'm almost positive they are made out of steel. In fact, I'd be willing to bet a six-pack of beer on it.
:p
 
Just a red herring. Over here we use plastic plates on concrete sleepers and spring steel clamps.

If you want some good spring steel the little folded clips that look like a large hair clip that bash into the plates you are talking about
are spring steel and hold a great edge.(the ones here anyway)

The dog spike are all kinds of steel. But I can only coment on Australians ones I have made axes and letter openers from the various kinds of spikes the modern spike for axes. I think you guys call them hawks. The old wrought iron I use for letter openers.

If you cut a thin slice of the plate off just try to heat treat it.
If it holds a good edge does it matter what it is called.
 
Reg- Thanks for the response, I just won an auction for a cuttig torch set-up on Ebay but until I get tanks I can't cut very easily so I get on here and pick peoples brains before I go out and lug back a ton of scrap I don't need (my wife has certain feelings about scrap in the yard). Plus I'm one of those people who like to know exactly what kind of metal everything is- especially a knife. I may get rich an famous for RR tie plate knives and I better know what kind of steel it is. This stuff fascinates me.
 
For $10 and shipping, Rex Walters will give you the exact composition of the metal. Search here and you will find his number. Ed Fowler does lots of testing with him. He works in a mill and is a source for 52100. He will work it into his testing schedule in a week or two for that price. He will also do more advanced analysis like grain size after forging for $25 to $50, depending on what information you want.
I just learned all this last week when I talked to him on the phone for the first time.
 
Yes your write I should be getting a bit more scientific in my approach.

I had a break for a long time just making letter openers for a tourist mine. the history of the material was all they wanted to know
and the history of the dog spikes and rail line.

I will need to do some research of 01 and a whole lot of other numbers.

Thanks for a prod in the right direction.
 
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