I don't think that you are going to find any railroad spikes that are going to have 0.6% carbon in them. They max out at about 0.35%. That's barely enough to harden the steel. If you use them I would suggest that you temper them at about 300-325?
You could well break down and use the rails for blades. As I understand it that's what the Japanese used to make swords for their armed forces during WWII. You will need that press or a power hammer to forge it down into usable sizes for knife making and you will burn up a lot of propane heating something as thick as the top part of the rail not to mention the acetylene to break down the rail. I couldn't tell you why the web and the bottom part of the rail couldn't be use. The rails are formed in dies from the same bar of steel. At any rate you may well find that you found steel is actually more expensive that a known steel bar from a supplier.
Doug
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