It has been my understanding that lumber usually traveled in double door boxcars whether it was being delivered or loaded at a lumberyard. Would it look unprotypical at a lumber yard siding to see a single door boxcar performing the function of delivery or loading lumber along with the double door boxcars ? If my understanding is incorrect, feel free to share your expertise with me.
When I was young I remember watching lumber being loaded into a boxcar by hand, stick by stick. Don’t remember the details, but something tells me it was a single door car.
The advantage of the double door cars is that fork lifts could get inside to help with the loading or unloading process. With single door cars there was not the same room and you might have to use a lot more manual labor, maybe even loading the boards individually. If you do spot a single door car, I would suggest you select one with a 10’ wide door, not a 6 footer.
Quite a few of the double door boxcars were originally built for carrying automobiles. Then the autorack cars took over the auto business more or or less completely, and the lumber industry enthusiastically adopted the old auto boxes. Bulkhead flat cars became the next great step forward, only to be cast aside in favor of the centerbeam.
To qualify my answer, though, I won’t claim to be an authority.
John
An aunt of mine has an old photo of a local lumber yard where an uncle of mine worked. Seems to me it reinforced a rememberance of mine that they got in loads from both single and double door boxes, and even tarp covered loads on regular flats.
But then, I also remember a pickel vat car being parked on a spur just outside the gate of another lumberyard.
Double door would be preferred for bundled or forklift loaded lumber. Single door is the default since there were waaaaaaaaay more single door cars.
Way back when, wood boxcars often had small doors in the end to assist loading lumber and similar long loads. Of course, there were no fork lifts to worry about then, either.
Fred W
…modeling foggy coastal Oregon, where it’s always 1900…