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Oregon California & Eastern Railroad- Log Cars

Oregon California & Eastern Railroad
Log Cars

Weyerhaeuser opened the Klamath Falls operation with a fleet of wood skeleton log cars, many to all of which had stencils showing them as having been built by Weyerhaeuser. The train crews in the later years often referred to these cars as "woodbellies". Photos show these cars numbered in the 300, 400, 500, and lower 600 series numbers. The cars served Weyerhaeuser well for decades, but their advanced age caught up with them by the middle 1970s as material fatigue started causing the cars to literally fall apart, occassionally resulting in spectacular wrecks, and Oregon regulators subjected the cars and their operation over common carrier rails to increasing scrutiny.


A string of the woodbellies sitting on the track connecting the OC&E and GN yards in Klamath Falls in 1957. Jack Bowden photo.


A closer shot of one of the woodbellies in 1957. Jack Bowden photo.


A string of woodbellies in Klamath Falls in 1971, after the log bunks had been replaced with rigid stakes. Jerry Lamper photo.


Another shot of a "woodbelly", this one of the #592 at Sycan in 1973. Jerry Lamper photo.


Weyerhaeuser #307 in Klamath Falls on 1 May 1977. Jerry Lamper photo.


Weyerhaeuser #622 in Sycan on 23 August 1973. Jerry Lamper photo.


Weyerhaeuser #477 at the Bly Mountain switchbacks. John Henderson photo.


Weyerhaeuser #477 at the Bly Mountain switchbacks. John Henderson photo.


Weyerhaeuser #489 with a broken back at Sycan on 23 August 1973. Jerry Lamper photo.
Weyerhaeuser in the early years also had some number of steel frame flat cars in logging service, by all appearances rebuilt from wood body outside braced boxcars. Photos show these cars in the upper 600 number series.


Several of the steel frame flatcars in Klamath Falls in 1970. Jack Bowden photo.


Weyerhaeuser #679 in Sycan on 23 August 1973. Jerry Lamper photo.


Looking down the decks of several of the steel frame log cars at Sycan on 23 August 1973. Jerry Lamper photo.
The substantial increase in log traffic that caused Weyerhaeuser to buy the OC&E in the first place coupled with the need to replace the original wood frame skeleton log cars forced the company to go on a log car acquisition binge starting in the middle 1970s. Weyerhaeuser bought what log cars it could find on the used market, mostly a number of former Burlington Northern cars, but had to rely heavily on other types of cars converted to log flats. The conversions included numerous 50-foot steel frame flatcars, but the Sycan shops also cut the bodies off of a number of boxcars and some drop bottom gondolas and then converted the frames to log flats. The Sycan shops also built a large number of steel skeleton log cars. Late in the Klamath operations Weyerhaeuser transferred a handful of former Milwaukee Road log flats south from their railroad operations in western Washington.


Former Burlington Northern car #632815 in Klamath Falls on 1 May 1977. Jerry Lamper photo.


Weyerhaeuser Timber #170, converted from a drop bottom gondola, in Klamath Falls. John Henderson photo.


Most of the log flats converted from boxcars ended up in the low 700-series and suffered from sagging frames, as seen here on the #729 in Klamath Falls on 1 May 1977. Jerry Lamper photo.


The Sycan shops added extra bracing to most of the log flats converted from boxcar frames, as seen on the #723 in Klamath Falls on 28 August 1984. Jerry Lamper photo.


Most of the log flats Weyerhauser acquired starting in the middle 1970s were standard 50-foot flatcars with added log bunks, such as the #156, seen here in Klamath Falls on 28 August 1984. Jerry Lamper photo.


Log flat #270 is wearing the later yellow scheme in Klamath Falls on 28 August 1984. Jerry Lamper photo.


A pair of log cars sitting behind the Sycan shop in early 1984. Jimmy Bryant photo.


Fifty-two foot flat #3097A is another conversion, possibly from an all-door boxcar. Jerry Lamper photo, Klamath Falls, 28 August 1984.


While most of the later log flats had two log bunks, some of the converted flatcars carried four, such as the #3003B in Klamath Falls on 28 August 1984. Jerry Lamper photo.


One of the steel skeleton cars built by the Sycan shops starting in the late 1970s. John Henderson photo, Jeff Moore collection.


Another example of the later skeleton cars is the #3101B, seen in Klamath Falls on 19 June 1982. Jerry Lamper photo.


In the late 1970s Weyerhaeuser brought in a few of these long cars from their operations in the Southern United States; car #315, seen here in Sycan, has lettering indicating it is leased to Weyerhaeuser in Plymouth, North Carolina. Jerry Lamper collection.


Weyerhaeuser #1007, another unusually long car, has lettering on the side stating "4 Short Logs Only". Sycan, Oregon, 28 August 1984. Jerry Lamper photo.
Weyerhaeuser had a total of 329 log cars on the roster when operations ended in 1990. The company initially signed a contract to sell the fleet to the Kiamichi Railroad in Oklahoma, but that deal fell through before any of the cars could be shipped. Train Mountain ended up purchasing 17 log flats along with some other equipment that are on display around their live steam railroad near Chiloquin, and another equipment dealer bought a few cars that spent a few years in the middle 1990s in storage on the McCloud Railway Company before vanishing, though four of them got re-sold to the Santa Cruz, Big Trees & Pacific where they are in service today as passenger cars. Scrappers cut up the rest of the fleet in the Klamath Falls yard, leaving two of the modern skeleton cars that remained on display in the yard along with diesel #101 for part of the 1990s before being moved to the Collier Logging Museum near Chiloquin where they are today. One other former Milwaukee Road car is on display at the Bly Mountain switchbacks, reportedly it was part of one of the last clean up trains operating west from Sycan but developed brake problems and got set out at the switchbacks and then just left there along with the rails underneath it when the rest of the railroad got scrapped.



One of the former Milwaukee Road log flats at Train Mountain near Chiloquin. James Hughes photo.



The two skeleton log cars in the site of the Klamath Falls yard in December 1994. Jeff Moore photo.



A closer look at one of the log cars in December 1994.



A truck under one of the log cars in December 1994. Jeff Moore photo.



The steel skeleton log cars on display at Collier Logging Museum. Jeff Moore photo.



Another shot of the skeleton log cars at Collier. Jeff Moore photo.



In the middle 1990s the Santa Cruz, Big Trees & Pacific Railroad, a tourist line in the Santa Cruz mountains in California, purchased four former Weyerhaeuser log flats then stored on the McCloud Railway Company in far northern California. McCloud Railway swung a deal where they removed the log bunks and did some other work on the cars, then marked them as "Home Shop for Repairs, Felton, California". The SCBT&P rebuilt the four cars for their excursion trains and numbered them 501-504.