  We study the time scale T to equipartition in a 1D lattice of N masses
coupled by quartic nonlinear (hard) springs (the Fermi-Pasta-Ulam beta model).
We take the initial energy to be either in a single mode gamma or in a package
of low frequency modes centered at gamma and of width delta-gamma, with both
gamma and delta-gamma proportional to N. These initial conditions both give,
for finite energy densities E/N, a scaling in the thermodynamic limit (large
N), of a finite time to equipartition which is inversely proportional to the
central mode frequency times a power of the energy density E/N. A theory of the
scaling with E/N is presented and compared to the numerical results in the
range 0.03 <= E/N <= 0.8.
