Some phases of railroad telegraph and telephone engineering

Another step in the improvement of iron wire for telephone circuits is due to oxyacetylene welding of the joints. This has been successfully done on the No. 8 B. W. G. iron wires of the Hocking Valley, Zanesville & Western, and Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railroads. The resistance of a welded joint is 95 per cent of that of an unspliced wire, whereas the usual soldered joint is 112 per cent of the unspliced wire. Many apparently soldered joints are really not soldered and are about 200 times the resistance of the same length of unspliced wire. The joints are painted with red lead after welding. The work is not excessive in cost and the result is a considerable reduction in resistance and is of a permanent nature. A recent job of welding on the C. C. C. and St. L. Ry., cut the transmission equivalent of the circuit almost in half.